Friday, January 04, 2008

One Man Caucus: 7 Questions for Gen. Petraeus   [Steve Schippert]

In what is an excellent interview published at Foreign Policy, Italy's RAI asked David Petraeus seven questions. His answers are very informative and easy for average Americans to wrap their heads around, sans often wonkish and technical counterinsurgency lingo that so often loses many right out of the gate in such discussions.

General Petraeus even somewhat dispels the title of the interview, "Seven Questions: Gen. David Petraeus on Winding down the Surge." He notes that it is proper to be more precise and note that it is a draw down of American forces in 'The Surge," but that with increasing Iraqi roles, "The Surge" will continue.

FP: Based on the experience of the British, who as they draw down are leaving a lot of instability behind them in southern Iraq, how can you can be confident going forward as U.S. forces withdraw?

DP: We have already begun a reduction, and we’ll reduce another number over the course of the next seven months. We do that with a reasonable degree of confidence because our surge is taking place and the Iraqi surge is taking place as well, and it amplifies what we have done. In fact, the Iraqis have formed 160,000 police, soldiers, border police, and other security force elements during the past year. To be sure, there’s an uneven nature to their quality, to their capability, and to their level of training and equipping, but they’re significant in quantity. And quantity does mean quality in counterinsurgency operations, because you’ve got to secure so many infrastructures against the terrorist and insurgent and militia elements. We think that what we have been handing over has been winnowed down in terms of the nature of the problem in a way that they can handle it. And only when they can handle it we will have this transfer.

FP: When is it going to happen?

DP: A number of provinces have already transitioned to Iraqi control. The latest has been Basra. There has been a lot of political maneuvering among all the political groups that are competing for power in that province, but they have finally come together. There is a strong Iraqi security forces leader, General Mohan, who has been able to build quite credible Iraqi security forces there that, if required, can implement the security measures necessary. Nonetheless, it’s very challenging. There are militia problems. There are criminal problems. But we think they are problems that they can handle with some coalition support, and that’s what the British forces down there are going to continue to provide.

The whole thing is not entirely long, not at all technically intimidating, and highly recommended for Americans who want to understand our current role and what the near- to mid-term future holds for Iraq and American involvement there.

Read the rest here.

01/04 01:30 PMShare