U.S. forces head out of Iraq cities

Washington —- The U.S. military in Iraq is abandoning —- deliberately and with little public notice —- a centerpiece of the widely acclaimed strategy it adopted nearly two years ago to turn the tide against the insurgency. It is moving American troops farther from the people they are trying to protect.

Starting in early 2007, with Iraq on the brink of all-out civil war, the troops were pushed into the cities and villages as part of a change in strategy that included President Bush’s decision to send more combat forces.

The bigger U.S. presence on the streets was credited by many with allowing the Americans and their Iraqi security partners to build trust among the populace, thus undermining the extremists’ tactics of intimidation, reducing levels of violence and giving new hope to resolving the country’s underlying political conflicts.

Now the Americans are reversing direction, consolidating in larger bases outside the cities and leaving security in the hands of the Iraqis while remaining within reach to respond as the Iraqi forces require.

The U.S. is on track to complete its shift out of all Iraqi cities by June 2009. That is one of the milestones in a political-military campaign plan devised in 2007 by Gen. David Petraeus, when he was the top U.S. commander in Iraq, and his political partner in Baghdad, Ambassador Ryan Crocker. The goal also is included in a preliminary security pact with the Iraqi government on the future U.S. military presence.

The shift is not explicitly linked to U.S. plans for increasing its military presence in Afghanistan, but there is an important connection: The logistical resources needed to house and supply a larger and more widely distributed U.S. force in Afghanistan have been tied up in Iraq. That will be somewhat relieved by consolidation of U.S. forces in Iraq onto larger, outlying bases that are easier to maintain.

These moves coincide with priorities expressed by President-elect Barack Obama during his campaign: reducing the U.S. military commitment in Iraq and putting more resources into Afghanistan. They also fit with Petraeus’ view that a more robust counterinsurgency approach is needed in Afghanistan: not only more troops but also getting them spread out into more villages.

But this also points up a major gamble in Iraq —-whether the Iraqis are ready to handle the insurgency themselves.

Retired Army Col. Peter Mansoor, who served as Petraeus’ right-hand man in Baghdad during the U.S. troop buildup and has written a book, “Baghdad at Sunrise,” about the counterinsurgency effort, said his main concern is sectarian violence.

“Without U.S. forces in the cities, the Shiite and Sunni militias could once again take to fighting each other without an honest broker to keep the peace. The Iraqi army is not ready to play this role, in my view —- not yet, anyway.”

Brig. Gen. Martin Post, deputy commander of U.S. forces in western Iraq, where the Sunni insurgency has sharply abated —- if not almost disappeared —- since 2007, said Monday his outfit is shutting down the U.S. base at Fallujah. The U.S. headquarters elements there are moving to al-Asad air base, a large but remote facility in the vast desert halfway between Fallujah and the Syrian border.

“There’s been a big effort to move all the Marine forces out of the cities,” Post said. “And so as you go throughout, from Fallujah all the way up the Euphrates River Valley, up to al-Qaim —- where we used to have Marines actually living in the cities —- we’ve pulled them all out.”