emitchell asked
WASHINGTON (AP) Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said he wants senior commanders in Iraq to consider whether the Pentagon underestimated how many U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces would be needed before a sovereign Iraqi government can take over next summer. Rumsfeld, who spent Saturday in Iraq, said he alone has raised doubts about whether the current goal of about 220,000 Iraqi security forces would be adequate, but he asked commanders to review their estimates. He was interviewed on the flight to Washington, arriving early Sunday after a weeklong trip that also included a stop in Afghanistan. ''I raised that question not because I have conviction that we need more, but because I worry that budgets will begin to get committed, and we may not know if we need more until sometime, for example, in February or March or April,'' he said. By then, he said, the money might not be available. ''I'm concerned that we might not have the option of increasing if, in fact, that proves to be necessary,'' he said. The number of Iraqis now in uniform is now said to be about 140,000, many of whom were rushed through training programs. The importance of building up those forces to perform duties now done by the U.S. military was a major theme of Rumsfeld's visit to Iraq. He sees it as the key to completing the military mission there in the aftermath of Saddam Hussein's deposed dictatorship. Iraq was the final stop on a trip that began in Brussels, Belgium, where Rumsfeld attended NATO meetings. He also went to the former Soviet republics of Azerbaijan and Georgia. In Iraq he met with senior U.S. commanders and Iraqi political figures in the northern city of Kirkuk and in Baghdad. He ate with American soldiers and watched Iraqis train for a new Civil Defense Corps, a paramilitary force designed to help in the hunt for holdouts from Saddam's regime. ''What I've just seen firsthand is the fact that the approach we've taken attempting to develop Iraqi security forces is the
105 answers · 0 comments
Answer this yourself in the app
See how this splits by age, gender, and region in the app.
