General: "Tough Days" Ahead In Iraq

Senate Committee Questions Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, President Bush's Choice To Lead U.S. Forces

(CBS/AP)  The Army general who would carry out President George W. Bush's U.S. troop buildup in Iraq urged patience Tuesday and predicted "tough days" ahead.

"None of this will be rapid," Lt. Gen. David Petraeus told the Senate Armed Services Committee. "The way ahead will be neither quick nor easy. There undoubtedly will be tough days."

Many in Congress, including some Republicans, oppose Mr. Bush's plan, which would send an extra 21,500 U.S. troops to Iraq as part of a revised strategy for quelling sectarian violence in Baghdad and stabilizing the country. Before the buildup began in recent days, there were 132,000 U.S. troops in Iraq.

Mr. Bush nominated Petraeus to replace Army Gen. George Casey as the senior American commander in Iraq. Petraeus told the committee he had spoken to Casey in recent days and that Casey said he favored Mr. Bush's troop buildup.

According to a recent CBS News poll, two-thirds of Americans remain opposed to the president's plan for sending additional U.S. troops to Iraq. And 72 percent believe he should seek congressional approval for the troop increase.

Sen. Carl Levin, a Democrat, chairman of the committee and a leading critic of Mr. Bush's Iraq policy, pressed Petraeus on whether the flow of additional U.S. troops could be halted in midstream if the Iraqi government failed to meet its commitment to provide thousands more Iraqi troops.

"It could," Petraeus replied. Earlier he said there were no "specific conditions" the Iraqis must meet in order to keep the flow of U.S. forces moving. The last of five additional U.S. brigades are scheduled to arrive in the Iraqi capital in May; the first got there just days ago.

Petraeus said that in the event the Iraqis did not meet their commitments, he would consult with Defense Secretary Robert Gates on how to respond.

In his opening statement, Petraeus, 54, painted a grim picture of conditions in Iraq.

"The situation in Iraq is dire," he said. "The stakes are high. There are no easy choices. The way ahead will be very hard. ... But hard is not hopeless."

Famous for challenging 20-year-old solders to push-up contests and winning, Petraeus has a nearly perfect resume for the position of commander of multi-national forces in Iraq, reports CBS News national security correspondent David Martin. He commanded the 101st Airborne in the initial invasion and was in charge of training Iraqi security forces.

Petraeus is considered a shoo-in to win Senate confirmation. Devoted early in the war to trying to win the hearts and minds of Iraqis, Petraeus later wrote the Pentagon manual on how to tackle insurgencies. He also previously supported expanding U.S. forces in the region.

Sen. John McCain, the top Republican on the committee and a leading proponent of Mr. Bush's troop buildup plan, asked Petraeus how long he thought the U.S. buildup could be sustained.

"I am keenly aware of the strain" on the Army and Marine Corps, Petraeus said, adding that he welcomes Mr. Bush's proposal to increase the size of the land forces over the coming five years.

Asked by McCain how soon he thought he would know whether the new strategy was working, Petraeus said, "We would have indicators at the least during the late summer." As currently planned, he said, the last of the five additional U.S. Army brigades would be ready to fight in Baghdad by the end of May.

Several committee members noted that Petraeus recently oversaw the writing of a new Army manual on how to counter an insurgency. Sen. Edward Kennedy asked him why an extra 21,500 troops would make a significant difference.

[tibu987]

"Tough Days Ahead in Iraq."
-
Would you point me in the direction of when it was NOT a tough day in Iraq for our soldiers and innocent Iraqi's.
And more to come?
Enough, please.

[agnim]

"General: "Tough Days" Ahead In Iraq"

Why endure "tough days" when we can pack up and leave the Iraqi hell hole?

Our heartless dear leader is just seeking to toss as many American lives as he can in the Iraqi hell hole

[karlimhof]

tucker

don't worry about lieberman he's got a bad case of hemorrhoids on the brain.

[lieberman18]

tucker,

Bush and Cheney indicted for War Crimes?

Heck, INDICT THE WHOLE DEMOCRATIC PARTY FOR WAR CRIMES. Clinton, for bombing Serbia when he should have been bombing Bin Laden is a start; his wife, for being the smug cuckolded shrill shrew she is; the Drunk Intern Killer for obvious reasons; Carter for being a coward and a bigot; Hanoi John for comparing his fellow soldiers to those of GenghiZ Khan, Robert KKK Byrd for BIGOTRY; Steppin Fetchit Obama for groveling after Byrd, and so on. Pelosi for Botox treatments - HA HA HA.

Now, do you still care to indict Bush? We've got a whole list of indictments of Dems - and our list will stick. Yours - well, you know where you can shove them, little boy.

LOL

[lieberman18]

So nice that the usual neo-fascist circus clowns who yearn for sharia and want our enemies to win are on board tonight.

Yep, blast General Petraeus. None of you bozos are even fit to shine the man's shoes.

Oh, and keep up with the Dickey C jokes and the Saudi connection thing. But there is one important thing you seem to forget clowns.

The first American President to send High-Tech military equipment to the House of Saud was none other than that coward and bigot Jimmy Carter. Carter could deplore the human rights under the Shah, and abandon him - but for weeeee Jimmeeeeh, the almighty buck was the thing - no matter how worse the House of Saud was compared to the Shah. They got the F-15s, Carter gave Iran Khomeini, and by extension Ahmedinejedad.

Chew on that one, clowns. Jim Webb, what a pompous twit.

[defirststate]

After the election little dickey c was dispatched to the Saudis. Afterwards, the new way forward became staying the course only with more of our soldiers. Is the administration spending our money and risking our soldiers' lives to insure that the Saudis don't have to wade into the mess we've made in Iraq? Could foreign power have that much influence over US policy? These same Saudis had the influence to get a flight from the US cleared while all non-military flights here were grounded after 9/11 and no protest has even been lodged even though 15 of the 19 hijackers and bin-Laden forgotten were Saudis

Does this administration serve the interests of the people of the US or some other master? If they serve some other interest they may actually be performing competently, traitorously, but competently. If they aren't they may really be the delusional, irrational, bumbling fools that they seem. The next 2 years don't bode well for us in either case.

Congress should consider impeachment proceedings against cabinet members and other high level officials involved in the selling the need for and the prosecution of the war. Impeachment isn%u2019t just for presidents. The drumbeats of pending doom could lead others to resign.

[grazinggoat]

...Bush is doing what behind me? D*mn George, would you act serious for one minute? I'm trying to get this guy ready for his job. haha hah, Georgie, that is funny. haha haha, stop tickling, ok, no massages for me. OK, Petraeus, any questions? Where's Iraq? I dunno, what do I look like an egghead or sumptin?"
Posted by SharnCedar

That's a good one. Look at the officer sitting behind Petraeus. He's falling asleep. Iraq is killing them... ;)

[sharncedar]

The general looks like he's about to laugh. He looks like the sales guy down at Best Buy. Maybe he was, big promotion. "Hey, Petraeus, get over here. Here's a military commission. You're in charge of Iraq. Sure, finish selling that big-screen TV first. Here's the key to the whisky cabinet. Here's the phone number for the broads. Are you laughing? Stop laughing, this is serious. What's that? President Bush is doing what behind me? D*mn George, would you act serious for one minute? I'm trying to get this guy ready for his job. haha hah, Georgie, that is funny. haha haha, stop tickling, ok, no massages for me. OK, Petraeus, any questions? Where's Iraq? I dunno, what do I look like an egghead or sumptin?"

[tuckerndfw]

I know how to solve the problem.

Replace our valuable soldiers with the useless, lying bast*rds who sent them over there.

Let's send all the neocons (Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, Chalabi, Wolfowitz, Perle, et al) and their entire families to the "combat zone" and let them do all of the community policing, including insurgent hunting.

That will solve the problem very quickly for a long time to come.


In the alternate, Bush, Cheney, et al, should be indicted for war crimes and upon being found guilty in trials conducted by their opponents, executed in the most gruesome manner possible.

What's good for "them" is surely good for "us."

George "Bozo" Bush is THE most corrupt & incompetent president in US history.

[tibu987]

correction:
the enemy is b-lls--t.