The Violent Consequences of a Pullout
The port city of Basra is a dangerous mess. And it looks to get worse as British troops depart
For that reason, some U.S. officials believe that following a British pullout, the United States may be forced to send its own, already overstretched troops to the south. "At the end of the day, I really don't see how the coalition can leave no forces in Basra," says Frederick Kagan, a military analyst at the American Enterprise Institute and an architect of the current "surge" strategy. "The issue entirely turns on the timing." To that end, the British may try to delay the pullout of the remaining 5,000 troops until the year's end, according to analysts there. That's because there is a great deal of concern about the impact of a British withdrawal on the relationship with Washington. "If they do this in an irresponsible fashion," says Kagan, "they are going to be dumping a burden on U.S. forces."
War weary. But Kagan and others concede that the withdrawal pressure on new British Prime Minister Gordon Brown is immense. Ultimately, says Rosemary Hollis, an Iraq expert at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London, protecting the British Army from being overstretched—there are now 7,000 British troops in Afghanistan—"must come ahead of the trans-Atlantic relationship." Says Kagan: "The British Army is overstrained—worse than the U.S." And, he adds, "the British population gave up on this war long ago."
The lack of public support is key in Britain, a factor that will prove increasingly pivotal on this side of the Atlantic as well. "The British recognize that they can't do much more, even though the situation isn't where they want it to be," says Hollis. American analysts add that turning the tide in Basra could take years. "To establish an enduring level of security, you're talking about an effort that could run the better part of a decade," says Krepinevich. "So you have to ask yourself, if you're going to stay that long, what are the odds that you'll succeed?"
That is the question that the U.S. military is now posing within the halls of the Pentagon. On Capitol Hill and within a growing segment of the American public, adds Krepinevich, Basra may portend the same question in another form: "Do we deplete our resources and bleed for another 10 years, or do we cut our losses now?"
With Thomas K. Grose in London
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