Murtha's plan for disengaging from Iraq is basically to remove the US troops from within Iraq within 6 months and to position approximately 50,000 troops in neighboring countries. These forces would be there to provide quick strike capability in case terrorist organizations within Iraq need to be neutralized. Murtha's plan has alot going for it, and it has gotten people talking about a disengagement strategy. However, while we should get our troops out of fighting ASAP, there are key tasks that Murtha has omitted and which need to be included in any final strategy for Iraq. The current debate is really just a discussion on timing - "stay the course" versus "withdraw immediately/soon". And this one dimensional debate is not going to lead to an effective solution for Iraq.
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A comprehensive plan to hand over military control to Iraq would include what? At or near the top of the list would be the ongoing training of the Iraq military - a training strategy. Such a strategy would include many different areas and dimensions. Moreover, such a strategy is not possible without thousands, if not tens of thousands, of US troops staying in Iraq for a few years. Yet, such training would allow our troops to be moved out of harms way on the front lines and into the background (for the most part).
Since only a few battalions of the Iraq Army are capable of fighting the insurgency without US support, obviously this area will need lots of additional training support. Also, Iraq has no air force to speak of, so large scale training will be needed here - not to mention assistance with the procurement of the needed military equipment. Other training areas include maintenance of military equipment and logisitical support.
Training is one key area, but there are others that need to be addressed. I will let others discuss these (any suggestions?). The liberal blog community should be articulating comprehensive strategies, not just debating who's plan for "when to leave Iraq" is correct. To this end, we need much more discussion and analysis of the critical tasks needed in our strategy for disengagement from Iraq.