Shift to Baghdad leaves western Iraq in limbo

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.registerguard.com/news/2006/10/10/a2.int.baghdad.1010.p1.php?section=nation_world

For months, soldiers from the 172nd Stryker Brigade fought in riverside towns of western Iraq, trying to clamp off the flow of foreign fighters and suicide bombers that commanders said were terrorizing Baghdad.

Now hundreds of these same U.S. soldiers have been sent to deal with what U.S. officials say is an even greater threat - rising attacks between Sunnis and Shiites in the capital itself.

Left behind in the dusty towns along the Euphrates River in Anbar province are fewer U.S. troops - and fears that hard-won gains could be in jeopardy from a Sunni Arab insurgency that is far from defeated.

``Seeing the fruits of your labor lost is frustrating,'' said Capt. David Ramirez of the 4th Squadron, 14th Cavalry Regiment, who was sent to Baghdad from western Iraq.

<snip>

``We do not have sufficient troop strength to secure the entire country simultaneously,'' Andrew Krepinevich, a military analyst, said in an e-mail to The Associated Press. ``Trying to be strong everywhere will lead us to being strong nowhere.''

[NOLADEM]

1. Limbo is probably an understatement

Outright civil war and lawlessness is more likely.

[Barrett808]

2. duperino

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=2553740&mesg_id=2553740

[Supersedeas]

3. Limbo - one of them there Condi vagaries wrapped in ambiguity