U.S. delays pullout, may ship more troops to Iraq

BAGHDAD, Iraq — The top U.S. commander in Iraq said Tuesday he may call for more troops to be sent to Baghdad, possibly by increasing the overall U.S. presence in Iraq, as rising bloodshed pushes Iraqi and American deaths to some of their highest levels of the war.

The commander, Gen. George Casey, also said he thought Iraqi forces would be ready to take over security no sooner than late 2007 or early 2008. The announcement of a 12- to 18-month target again pushes back the withdrawal of the bulk of the 145,000 or so U.S. troops in Iraq.

Casey spoke alongside U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad at a rare, joint news conference in Baghdad's Green Zone. Both men acknowledged the course and nature of the war changed this year, as Iraq's Shiite Muslim majority and Sunni minority battle for power, resources and survival.

"Make no mistake about it: We are in a tough fight here in the center of the country and in Anbar province," Casey said, emphasizing the worst of the bloodletting was in Baghdad.

Casey said later that additional troops for Baghdad could come from a variety of sources, including from the Iraqi military, from U.S. forces elsewhere in Iraq or from outside the theater.

Khalilzad framed the Iraqi conflict as part of the struggle for security in the Middle East, which he called "the challenge of our age."

"My message today is straightforward: Despite the difficult challenges we face, success in Iraq is possible and can be achieved on a realistic timetable," he said.

But events inside and outside the Green Zone on Tuesday highlighted the basic problems with which U.S. forces have struggled since the 2003 invasion: security and infrastructure. The deaths of four more U.S. troops were announced — two Marines, a soldier and a Navy sailor — bringing October's death toll to 91, the deadliest month for U.S. troops this year. As of Tuesday, at least 2,801 members of the U.S. military have died in the Iraq war, according to an Associated Press count.

And Casey and Khalilzad, the top U.S. military and civilian leaders in Iraq, were left for several minutes to deliver their remarks in darkness illuminated only by the battery-powered lights of TV camera crews.

One of Baghdad's frequent power outages cut electricity to the converted parking garage that houses the U.S. military media center, briefly knocking the internationally broadcast conference off the air.

For Casey and his predecessors, whether President Bush dedicated enough troops to the Iraq war has been one of the questions most frequently asked and debated. While Casey has raised troop strength temporarily as high as 150,000 for Iraqi national elections, his stock answer has been that if he believed more troops were needed, he would ask for them.

On Tuesday, Casey said he might ask for them.

If Iraqi leaders can resolve their differences and if Iraqi security forces improve, "I think [we] can put Iraq in a very good place in 12 months.

"Now, do we need more troops to do that? Maybe."

It is not clear whether Iraqi or U.S. forces in Iraq, already stretched thin, could provide substantially more troops for duty in the capital, however.

U.S. commanders moved at least 6,000 more U.S. troops to Baghdad over the summer in an effort to arrest the violence in the capital. To get those extra troops, commanders took the unpopular step of extending one unit's deployment just as it was going home to Alaska and calling in emergency reserves based in Kuwait.

About 15,000 U.S. troops and 9,000 Iraqi soldiers are deployed in Baghdad for the special security operation. Despite this, violence has climbed more than 43 percent since midsummer.

Casey said U.S. and Iraqi authorities would adjust their Baghdad military plan to combat the rising attacks. He declined to give specifics.

U.S. and Iraqi leaders also were adjusting political goals in Iraq, Khalilzad said.

Khalilzad said Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki had agreed to timelines for accomplishing several specific goals, including developing a plan to deal with militias and reforming Iraq's Interior Ministry by the end of the year.

Militias connected to the Shiite religious parties that lead Iraq's government are accused by U.S. officials, Iraqi Sunnis and others of being lead players in increasingly brazen attacks on Sunnis.

In the south, where Sunnis are few, Shiite militias fight each other.

Khalilzad said Iraq leaders have agreed that, in the next 12 months, they will come up with a national compact for reconciliation and a plan that fairly shares Iraq's oil wealth, have a program on militias in place and work on Iraq's security institutions.

However, U.S. officials revealed neither specific incentives for the Iraqis to implement the plan nor penalties for their failure to do so.

The lack of political consensus even among Shiites has made it extremely difficult for Iraqi leaders to meet previous deadlines; for example, they missed targeted dates on naming a government and in moving forward on constitutional amendments. Moreover, Tuesday's declarations lacked specifics on how to accomplish the goals.

In Washington, Republicans generally ignored the comments. Bush made no effort to draw attention to the remarks while campaigning for GOP candidates in Florida, and Vice President Dick Cheney didn't mention them in an interview with conservative Fox News commentator Sean Hannity.

But some Democrats responded by demanding the United States pull out troops if Iraqis miss their deadlines.

"We need to make clear that American troops will be leaving within a year to force Iraqis to make the tough compromises," said Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. "Only then do we have a chance to make Iraqis stand up for Iraq and bring our troops home."

Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., a member of the Armed Services Committee, said the Bush administration has presented Americans with constantly shifting goals, making it difficult to believe these objectives can be met.

Material from McClatchy Newspapers and the Chicago Tribune is included in this report.