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Igor Dunjic-Duke
WASHINGTON - Commanders in Iraq have decided to begin the drawdown of
U.S. forces in volatile Diyala province, marking a turning point in
the U.S. military mission, The Associated Press has learned.
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Instead of replacing the 3rd Brigade of the 1st Cavalry Division,
which is returning to its home base at Fort Hood, Texas, in December,
soldiers from another brigade in Salahuddin province next door will
expand into Diyala, thereby broadening its area of responsibility,
several officials said Tuesday.
In this way, the number of Army ground combat brigades in Iraq will
fall from 20 to 19. This reflects President Bush's bid to begin
reducing the American military force and shifting its role away from
fighting the insurgency toward more support functions like training
and advising Iraqi security forces.
The December move, which has not yet been announced by the Pentagon,
was described to the AP by Col. Stephen Twitty, commander of the 4th
Brigade, 1st Cavalry, in a telephone interview Tuesday. It was
confirmed by three other officials in Iraq, including Lt. Col. Michael
Donnelly, chief spokesman for the commanding general of U.S. forces in
northern Iraq, Maj. Gen. Benjamin Mixon.
The idea is to avoid vacating a contested area, like Diyala, which is
northeast of Baghdad, while beginning Bush's announced reduction of at
least 21,500 troops, of which 17,000 were sent to the Baghdad area
last spring.
The shift in Diyala in December could be a model for follow-on
reductions next year, with a redrawing of the U.S. lines of
responsibility so that a departing brigade has its battle space
consumed by a remaining brigade. At the same time, Iraqi security
forces would assume greater responsibility.
Diyala province is a battered landscape of warring tribes, fertile
valleys and pockets of al-Qaida fighters. The sectarian and tribal
chasms are wide. Commanders cited signs of substantial progress in the
months since thousands of U.S. and Iraqi forces stormed the provincial
capital of Baqouba in June.
The unit leaving in December, the 3rd Brigade of the 1st Cavalry, has
been in Iraq since October 2006. When it leaves, the 4th Stryker
Brigade of the 2nd Infantry Division, now in Salahuddin province, will
add Diyala to its area of responsibility.
Donnelly said that even though the number of combat brigades in Iraq
will drop by one with the departure of the 3rd Brigade of the 1st
Cavalry, the total number of soldiers in northern Iraq will remain
almost constant. That is because later in December a unit arriving
from Fort Hood - the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment - has substantially
more soldiers than the unit it will replace.
It is not yet clear how the rest of the five-brigade reduction will be
carried out; the cuts are to be completed by July 2008, under a plan
recommended by Gen. David Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq, and
announced by Bush in September. It probably will include some fresh
reductions in the western province of Anbar, where insurgent violence
has declined substantially this year.
When Bush announced on Sept. 13 that security in Iraq had improved
enough to permit the withdrawal of five brigades between December and
next July, commanders said they had not yet figured out how it would
be done. The reductions will shrink the U.S. force from 20 combat
brigades to 15, which is the total that prevailed before Bush decided
in January to add five brigades as the centerpiece of a new strategy
designed to tamp down sectarian violence mainly in Baghdad.
The 4th Stryker Brigade that will expand its battle space into Diyala
province is one of those five so-called surge brigades. It got to Iraq
in April and is scheduled to remain until July 2008.
In remarks at the Pentagon on Tuesday, Lt. Gen. Carter Ham, the chief
of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the pace at which
the five Army brigades are withdrawn "isn't mechanical" and will be
slowed or accelerated depending on commanders' assessment of security
progress.