Outgoing U.S. leader says Iraq needs aid [Archive] - Marine Corps

thedrifter

12-13-06, 06:37 AM

Exiting general says force alone won't bring peace
He sees answer in jobs, electricity and drinkable water
- Nancy Trejos, Washington Post
Wednesday, December 13, 2006

(12-13) 04:00 PST Baghdad -- The outgoing top U.S. field commander in Iraq said on Tuesday that military might alone will not win the war and that the withdrawal of U.S. troops will not happen quickly.

"I wish I could tell you exactly how long it's going to take and exactly when U.S. forces and coalition forces could go home, but I am just not able to do that," said U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Peter Chiarelli, commander of the Multinational Corps of Iraq.

Chiarelli, who is preparing to end his second one-year tour in Iraq, gave a mostly positive but sober assessment of U.S. military involvement in Iraq.

He praised his forces' efforts to tamp down the violence that escalated after the bombing of a Shiite mosque in Samarra in February. But he acknowledged that securing Iraq is taking longer than expected.

"None of us would make the claim that it's going as fast as we want it to go," he said.

Top military leaders had declared 2006 the "year of the police" -- an acknowledgment of the importance of training not just the Iraqi army but also the police in any strategy for withdrawing U.S. troops.

But Chiarelli said that the infiltration of Iraqi police by militias is more extensive than he had thought.

"The 'year of the police' is going to take us longer than we thought it was going to take us," Chiarelli said. He expressed frustration "that we seem to be totally focused on the military solution to this, like somehow it will be the thing that will win this."

He said that deploying additional U.S. forces would not solve Iraq's problems, but providing jobs, electricity and drinkable water and cleaning up streets would.

"If I could drive down unemployment in this country just to something that was reasonable, or if other people could help me drive unemployment down here," he said, "I promise you, our casualty figures would not be as high, nor would Iraqi casualties be as high as they are today, nor would the level of violence be as high as it is today."

The military has been embedding U.S. advisers with Iraqi army divisions and national police since 2004. There are 300 such teams throughout the country, each with 10 to 15 service members.

U.S. Brig. Gen. Dana Pittard, commanding general of the Iraq Assistance Group, which oversees the teams, said on Tuesday that he plans to add service members to each team.

But Pittard warned against relying too much on the transition teams. He said training the Iraqi forces should be coupled with a reconciliation of the government's warring factions as well as economic and quality of life improvements.

"The embedded transition team is not the Rosetta stone of Iraq," he said after meeting with 3rd Iraqi Army Division leaders in the al-Asik base near Mosul.

The division, one of three in the country that has taken over control of security in its community, oversees an area spanning about 30 miles between Mosul and Tal Afar in northern Iraq.

Pittard was reluctant to give a timetable for withdrawal. He called 2008 a "good goal" but said, "We really have to see how 2007 goes."

The death toll rose to at least 63, with at least 200 wounded, in a bombing Tuesday at Baghdad's Tayaran Square, where casual workers congregate in an attempt to find work as construction workers, cleaners and painters.

Interior Ministry spokesman Brig. Abdul-Karim Khalaf, who gave the official police account of Tuesday's attack, said at least 63 people were killed and 236 were wounded. Other police put the death toll as high as 71.

Police initially said it was a coordinated bomb attack involving a minivan and a car, but later said there was only one bombing.

Parliament speaker Mahmoud al-Mashhadani, a Sunni, said the attack targeted poor people who were trying to feed their families, "turning them into pieces of flesh" and urged the deeply divided legislature of Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds "to find a solution" to Iraq's many problems.

In other developments Tuesday:

-- The U.S. command announced five more deaths of U.S. troops in Iraq, including three Marines killed in combat in Anbar province.

The three Marines assigned to 3rd Marine Aircraft Wing died Monday of wounds sustained while fighting insurgents, according to a statement. The five deaths raised to 51 the number of U.S. troops who have died this month.

-- An Iraqi cameraman working for the Associated Press was shot to death by insurgents while covering clashes in Mosul, police said.

Aswan Ahmed Lutfallah, 35, was having his car repaired when insurgents and police began fighting nearby, and he rushed to cover the clash, police Brig. Abdul-Karim Ahmed Khalaf said. Insurgents spotted him filming, approached him and shot him to death, Khalaf said, citing an initial report.

Lutfallah had not reported any prior threats against him.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Ellie