US ‘prepares for failure’ in Iraq surge

[spindrifter]

From The Sunday Times
February 11, 2007

Sarah Baxter, Washington and Hamoudi Saffar, Baghdad

AS America’s troop surge in Baghdad gathers force, Robert Gates, the defence secretary, is already planning for failure. If the battle for security in Iraq does not succeed, he has told Congress he is prepared to move troops “out of harm’s way”.

Policy experts at the Pentagon are drawing up plans for a fresh change in strategy should it be required. “I would be irresponsible if I weren’t thinking about what the alternatives might be,” Gates said.

General David Petraeus, the “warrior scholar” and expert on counter-insurgency, took up command of his forces in Iraq yesterday as joint US-Iraqi security sweeps of Sunni and Shi’ite neighbourhoods got under way.

“The stakes are high,” Petraeus said at yesterday’s handover ceremony. “The way ahead will be hard but it is not hopeless. The mission is doable.”

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article1364760.ece

[originalpckelly]

1. I remember criticizing them for not planning for failure...

I think that's only responsible. I differ with their plans, but at least they are considering it.

While I don't like their plans at all, I do have to say it seems they can't win.

[Bonhomme Richard]

2. Gates may be planning for failure but I don't think bush is.

Shrub is fixated on Iran and leaving Iraq for the next president to deal with.

[Xipe Totec]

3. It's damned hard to win,

if you don't even know what winning would look like.

What do we mean when we say we want victory in Iraq?

I have no clue.

[spindrifter]

4. At this point, it

seems like "winning" would just be getting the violence down so people don't have to be afraid to go to the market or visit the hospital.

[Xipe Totec]

6. In that case, winning is easy

leave.

We are the focus of chaos in Iraq.

There is nothing we can do to lessen the death and destruction we have wrought, but our presence only prolongs the suffering.

Let us leave, and focus on bringing the culprits to justice.

[sam sarrha]

5. just check if they ordered another 20,000 body bags..

[uppityperson]

7. That is good, plan for win, plan for failure, make all sorts of plans

Good for those who are figuring out contingency plans.

[goforit]

8. Duh...it's bout time.

[moondust]

9. They'd be fools if they didn't.

In a highly volatile and unpredictable situation where you could conceivably have some small nukes or dirty bombs detonating or a counter-invasion by a large army from Syria and/or Iran, you definitely need a Plan B to get out at a moment's notice. The fact that they haven't had an emergency exit plan in place for the past 4 years probably constitutes negligence.