Vol. 75/No. 19      May 16, 2011

Even without a formal request, the U.S. State Department is planning to double U.S. embassy personnel in Iraq and open a consulate in the Kurdish areas in the north. Wall Street Journal columnist Max Boot reported in mid-April that the plans include deploying “1,000 diplomats backed by 16,000 contractors.” The latter are often former members of U.S. Special Operations forces.

Some 50,000 U.S. troops are operating in Iraq, down from a peak of some 170,000 at the height of the U.S. war and occupation. According to the Journal, the U.S. forces are “conducting counterterrorism missions” and “assisting and advising Iraqi” troops, another way of saying they are still involved in combat.

While the Pentagon rebuilt the Iraqi army following the 2003 U.S. invasion, it has little confidence in its fighting capacity without U.S. supervision. The Iraqi military has no fighter planes, no artillery, and only 70 tanks.

The U.S. ruling class is worried that the relatively stable government it has cobbled together in Iraq could unravel if U.S. troops withdraw. Washington also wants to counter Iranian influence, among both Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq.

U.S. secretary of defense Robert Gates toured Iraq in early April. “If folks here are going to want us to have a presence,” he told the press, “we’re going to need to get on with it pretty quickly.”  
 
 
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