Leaving Iraq: Last U.S. Combat Brigade Departs
Updated at 7:23 a.m. Eastern.
As their convoy reached the barbed wire at the border crossing out of Iraq on Wednesday, the soldiers whooped and cheered. Then they scrambled out of their stifling hot armored vehicles, unfurled an American flag and posed for group photos.
For these troops of the 4th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, it was a moment of relief fraught with symbolism. Seven years and five months after the U.S.-led invasion, the last American combat brigade was leaving Iraq.
As CBS News chief White House correspondent Chip Reid reports, the pullout comes two weeks before President Obama's Aug. 31 deadline to formally end U.S. combat operations in Iraq, and just two days after a deadly car bombing killed 61 people and wounded 125 more in Baghdad, evidence that, despite the long war, Iraq remains a dangerous and volatile place.
Iraq Withdrawal: What are Non-Combat Troops?
According to the Pentagon, the combat mission isn't over, and it won't be until the end of the month, as planned. CBS News correspondent Whit Johnson reports that 6,000 combat troops will stay in the country until that deadline is met, according to defense officials.
"To say the combat mission has come to an end because this brigade pulled out" is wrong, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told CBS News.
"We still have plenty trigger pullers there," a U.S. Army spokesman told CBS on Wednesday evening.
Anther 50,000 troops will stay in Iraq for a year, beginning in September, in what is designated as a noncombat role. They will carry weapons to defend themselves and accompany Iraqi troops on missions (but only if asked). Special forces will continue to help Iraqis hunt for terrorists.
"We're going to transition from combat operations to stability operations," U.S. military spokesman Maj. Gen. Stephen Lanza told "The Early Show" co-anchor Harry Smith Thursday.
U.S. officials close to the Obama administration's Iraq planning, meanwhile, have told the New York Times that a swarm of civilian diplomatic and security workers will soon be faced with the daunting task of keeping both themselves and the Iraqi people safe, as American troops prepare to leave the still-fragile democracy behind.
Lanza, speaking via satellite from Baghdad, said he was confident the Iraqi security forces were ready to protect their country.
He praised the Iraqi soldiers and national police for showing a "commitment to abide by the Iraqi constitution" and to remain above the divisive politics that have blocked the country from forming a stable new government, five months after national elections.
"They have shown they can secure the country for the election," said Lanza, adding that the Iraqis have exhibited "the will, the professionalism and the ethos," to take over from the Americans.
When 18-year-old Spc. Luke Dill first rolled into Iraq as part of the U.S. invasion, his Humvee was so vulnerable to bombs that the troops lined its floor with flak jackets.
Now a 25 and a staff sergeant after two tours of duty, he rode out of Iraq this week in a Stryker, an eight-wheeled behemoth encrusted with armor and add-ons to ward off grenades and other projectiles.
"It's something I'm going to be proud of for the rest of my life - the fact that I came in on the initial push and now I'm leaving with the last of the combat units," he said.
He remembered three straight days of mortar attacks outside the city of Najaf in 2003, so noisy that after the firing ended, the silence kept him awake at nights. He recalled the night skies over the northern city of Mosul being lit up by tracer bullets from almost every direction.
Now, waiting for him back in Olympia, Wash., is the "Big Boy" Harley-Davidson he purchased from one of the motorcycle company's dealerships at U.S. bases in Iraq - a vivid illustration of how embedded the American presence has become since the invasion of March 20, 2003.
So the U.S. death toll - at least 4,415 by Pentagon count as of Wednesday - may not yet be final.
The Stryker brigade, based in Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state and named for the vehicle that delivers troops into and out of battle, has lost 34 troops in Iraq. It was at the forefront of many of the fiercest battles, including operations in eastern Baghdad and Diyala province, an epicenter of the insurgency, during "the surge" of 2007. It evacuated troops at the battle of Tarmiyah, an outpost where 28 out of 34 soldiers were wounded holding off insurgents.
Before the Aug. 31 deadline, about half the brigade's 4,000 soldiers flew out like most of the others leaving Iraq, but its leadership volunteered to have the remainder depart overland. That decision allowed the unit to keep 360 Strykers in the country for an extra three weeks.
U.S. commanders say it was the brigade's idea, not an order from on high. The intent was to keep additional firepower handy through the "period of angst" that followed Iraq's inconclusive March 7 election, said brigade chief, Col. John Norris.
It took months of preparation to move the troops and armor across more than 500 kilometers (300 miles) of desert highway through potentially hostile territory.
The Strykers left the Baghdad area in separate convoys over a four-day period, traveling at night because the U.S.-Iraq security pact - and security worries - limit troop movements by day.
Along the way, phalanxes of American military Humvees sat at overpasses, soldiers patrolled the highways for roadside bombs, and Apache attack helicopters circled overhead as the Strykers refueled alongside the highway.
Chief Warrant Officer 3 Gus McKinney, a brigade intelligence officer, acknowledged that moving the convoys overland put soldiers at risk, but said the danger was less than in past.
The biggest threat was roadside bombs planted by Shiite extremist groups who have a strong foothold in the south, McKinney said.
But except for camels straying into the road, and breakdowns that required some vehicles to be towed, there were no incidents.
The worst of the ride was conditions inside the Strykers - sitting for hours in a cramped space - and the temperatures outside that reached 120 Fahrenheit.
The driver's compartment is called the "hellhole" because it sits over the engine and becomes almost unbearably hot. The vehicle commander and gunner can sit up in hatches to see the outside world. At the tail end are hatches for two gunners. Eight passengers - an infantry squad in combat conditions - can squeeze in the back.
Riding as a passenger felt a bit like being in a World War II-era submarine - a tight fit and no windows. The air conditioning was switched off to save fuel on the long ride south to Kuwait. Men dozed or listened to music on earphones.
When the convoy finally reached the sandy border, two soldiers, armed and helmeted, jumped off their vehicle and raced each other into Kuwait.
Once out of Iraq, there was still work to be done. Vehicles had to be stripped of ammunition and spare tires, and eventually washed and packed for shipment home.
Meanwhile, to the north, insurgents kept up a relentless campaign against the country's institutions and security forces, killing five Iraqi government employees in roadside bombings and other attacks Wednesday. Coming a day after a suicide bomber killed 61 army recruits in central Baghdad, the latest violence highlighted the shaky reality left by the departing U.S. combat force and five months of stalemate over forming Iraq's next government.
For Dill, who reached Kuwait with an earlier convoy, the withdrawal engendered feelings of relief. His mission - to get his squad safely out of Iraq - was accomplished.
Standing alongside a hulking Stryker, his shirt stained with sweat, he acknowledged the men who weren't there to experience the day with him.
"I know that to my brothers in arms who fought and died, this day would probably mean a lot, to finally see us getting out of here," he said.
© 2010 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report. As their convoy reached the barbed wire at the border crossing out of Iraq on Wednesday, the soldiers whooped and cheered. Then they scrambled out of their stifling hot armored vehicles, unfurled an American flag and posed for group photos.
For these troops of the 4th Stryker Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division, it was a moment of relief fraught with symbolism. Seven years and five months after the U.S.-led invasion, the last American combat brigade was leaving Iraq.
As CBS News chief White House correspondent Chip Reid reports, the pullout comes two weeks before President Obama's Aug. 31 deadline to formally end U.S. combat operations in Iraq, and just two days after a deadly car bombing killed 61 people and wounded 125 more in Baghdad, evidence that, despite the long war, Iraq remains a dangerous and volatile place.
Iraq Withdrawal: What are Non-Combat Troops?
According to the Pentagon, the combat mission isn't over, and it won't be until the end of the month, as planned. CBS News correspondent Whit Johnson reports that 6,000 combat troops will stay in the country until that deadline is met, according to defense officials.
"To say the combat mission has come to an end because this brigade pulled out" is wrong, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman told CBS News.
"We still have plenty trigger pullers there," a U.S. Army spokesman told CBS on Wednesday evening.
Anther 50,000 troops will stay in Iraq for a year, beginning in September, in what is designated as a noncombat role. They will carry weapons to defend themselves and accompany Iraqi troops on missions (but only if asked). Special forces will continue to help Iraqis hunt for terrorists.
"We're going to transition from combat operations to stability operations," U.S. military spokesman Maj. Gen. Stephen Lanza told "The Early Show" co-anchor Harry Smith Thursday.
U.S. officials close to the Obama administration's Iraq planning, meanwhile, have told the New York Times that a swarm of civilian diplomatic and security workers will soon be faced with the daunting task of keeping both themselves and the Iraqi people safe, as American troops prepare to leave the still-fragile democracy behind.
Lanza, speaking via satellite from Baghdad, said he was confident the Iraqi security forces were ready to protect their country.
He praised the Iraqi soldiers and national police for showing a "commitment to abide by the Iraqi constitution" and to remain above the divisive politics that have blocked the country from forming a stable new government, five months after national elections.
"They have shown they can secure the country for the election," said Lanza, adding that the Iraqis have exhibited "the will, the professionalism and the ethos," to take over from the Americans.
When 18-year-old Spc. Luke Dill first rolled into Iraq as part of the U.S. invasion, his Humvee was so vulnerable to bombs that the troops lined its floor with flak jackets.
Now a 25 and a staff sergeant after two tours of duty, he rode out of Iraq this week in a Stryker, an eight-wheeled behemoth encrusted with armor and add-ons to ward off grenades and other projectiles.
"It's something I'm going to be proud of for the rest of my life - the fact that I came in on the initial push and now I'm leaving with the last of the combat units," he said.
He remembered three straight days of mortar attacks outside the city of Najaf in 2003, so noisy that after the firing ended, the silence kept him awake at nights. He recalled the night skies over the northern city of Mosul being lit up by tracer bullets from almost every direction.
Now, waiting for him back in Olympia, Wash., is the "Big Boy" Harley-Davidson he purchased from one of the motorcycle company's dealerships at U.S. bases in Iraq - a vivid illustration of how embedded the American presence has become since the invasion of March 20, 2003.
So the U.S. death toll - at least 4,415 by Pentagon count as of Wednesday - may not yet be final.
The Stryker brigade, based in Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state and named for the vehicle that delivers troops into and out of battle, has lost 34 troops in Iraq. It was at the forefront of many of the fiercest battles, including operations in eastern Baghdad and Diyala province, an epicenter of the insurgency, during "the surge" of 2007. It evacuated troops at the battle of Tarmiyah, an outpost where 28 out of 34 soldiers were wounded holding off insurgents.
Before the Aug. 31 deadline, about half the brigade's 4,000 soldiers flew out like most of the others leaving Iraq, but its leadership volunteered to have the remainder depart overland. That decision allowed the unit to keep 360 Strykers in the country for an extra three weeks.
U.S. commanders say it was the brigade's idea, not an order from on high. The intent was to keep additional firepower handy through the "period of angst" that followed Iraq's inconclusive March 7 election, said brigade chief, Col. John Norris.
It took months of preparation to move the troops and armor across more than 500 kilometers (300 miles) of desert highway through potentially hostile territory.
The Strykers left the Baghdad area in separate convoys over a four-day period, traveling at night because the U.S.-Iraq security pact - and security worries - limit troop movements by day.
Along the way, phalanxes of American military Humvees sat at overpasses, soldiers patrolled the highways for roadside bombs, and Apache attack helicopters circled overhead as the Strykers refueled alongside the highway.
Chief Warrant Officer 3 Gus McKinney, a brigade intelligence officer, acknowledged that moving the convoys overland put soldiers at risk, but said the danger was less than in past.
The biggest threat was roadside bombs planted by Shiite extremist groups who have a strong foothold in the south, McKinney said.
But except for camels straying into the road, and breakdowns that required some vehicles to be towed, there were no incidents.
The worst of the ride was conditions inside the Strykers - sitting for hours in a cramped space - and the temperatures outside that reached 120 Fahrenheit.
The driver's compartment is called the "hellhole" because it sits over the engine and becomes almost unbearably hot. The vehicle commander and gunner can sit up in hatches to see the outside world. At the tail end are hatches for two gunners. Eight passengers - an infantry squad in combat conditions - can squeeze in the back.
Riding as a passenger felt a bit like being in a World War II-era submarine - a tight fit and no windows. The air conditioning was switched off to save fuel on the long ride south to Kuwait. Men dozed or listened to music on earphones.
When the convoy finally reached the sandy border, two soldiers, armed and helmeted, jumped off their vehicle and raced each other into Kuwait.
Once out of Iraq, there was still work to be done. Vehicles had to be stripped of ammunition and spare tires, and eventually washed and packed for shipment home.
Meanwhile, to the north, insurgents kept up a relentless campaign against the country's institutions and security forces, killing five Iraqi government employees in roadside bombings and other attacks Wednesday. Coming a day after a suicide bomber killed 61 army recruits in central Baghdad, the latest violence highlighted the shaky reality left by the departing U.S. combat force and five months of stalemate over forming Iraq's next government.
For Dill, who reached Kuwait with an earlier convoy, the withdrawal engendered feelings of relief. His mission - to get his squad safely out of Iraq - was accomplished.
Standing alongside a hulking Stryker, his shirt stained with sweat, he acknowledged the men who weren't there to experience the day with him.
"I know that to my brothers in arms who fought and died, this day would probably mean a lot, to finally see us getting out of here," he said.
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I am really taken back by the venom being spewed towards military members about the "pull out".
Why? you all who signed up HAPPILY during the Bush regime's tenure I see as nothing less than bush regime ENABLERS enabling that madman to wage war and illegal occupation against a country that had NO wmd's and had nothing to do with 9/11, and which has cost us now over a TRILLION DOLLARS, this cost has only begun when you factor in lifetime VA benefits for artificial computer controlled $50,000 limbs needing replacing every few years for life, and all the rest of the VA benefits, not to mention replacing all the planes, tanks and equipment trashed in 7 years of desert sand.
"jgg000101 August 19, 2010
this is nothing more than an attempt by obama to pull a bouquet of roses out of his rear end while everything else around him crashes down on his head. obama is politicizing this war in an attempt to save his skin. "
Oh bullchit, maybe you were asleep in church or something during his campaign when he made a campaign PROMISS to bring the troops home and end the occupation, and he set a deadline soon after, and now the deadline is HERE and you accuse the man of politicizing the war!
It's political mumbo jumbo aimed at appealing to morons like you who can't see your hand in front of your face. Oh, and yea, I also picked up on your "asleep at church" comment, you athiest slimeball. But unfortunately for you I paid attention to your messiah's campaign promises which were also pure BS. How's that gitmo closure working out for you? How's not allowing iran to have nuclear weapons working out?
How's the economic recovery working out for you? Maybe you should pull your head out of obama's duodenum.
We love our nation - this is why we volunteer to serve. I have watched my friends die and watched others die... I wish to God that this war would have not occoured but, maybe history will write it as being necessary. No matter how much you are against us - I ask for all citizens to be thankful that someone is willing to get up off of their rear end and fight for our nation. BIG News - we are less that 1% of the US population. Amazing... a nation full of people and less than 1% volunteer to serve in the military.
We are not perfect, we are humans just trying to make it safe for all families in America and the world... even for those who spit on us when we come home. I know that some people in the American public hate us. They did it to the WWI, WWII, Korean Conflict, Vietnam War and Desert Storm veterans. Even though it really hurts, we have and will bare the same "burden of shame" that all other veterans have in the past. We have enough burdens of doing our duties but, an extra burden is added when those who we expect to love us, shame and alienate us. I expect to get looks of disgust when I get home. I expect for some people to not understand my reason for serving. I even expect some to spit on me,curse me, and wag their head as I walk by in my uniform. As I said before nothing is glorious about war... going there, being there and coming back. No thanks will be heard but from those who understand the struggle(s) that we have faced in the past 7 years. For the rest - I dont know and really dont care what they will say... I have comrades to place my confidence in. No I am not a General or some high ranking military leader... Just an average GI trying to do my best for our country. I wish that every (war hating, GI hating) American citizen could see that.
It's the political blundering and lying which got the country into this war that folks are upset about.
when does the invasion of North Korea begin?
Oh. Wait. I forgot.
There's nothing of value there.
Friday, April 6, 2007
Captured Iraqi documents and intelligence interrogations of Saddam Hussein and two former aides "all confirmed" that Hussein's regime was not directly cooperating with al-Qaeda before the U.S. invasion of Iraq, according to a declassified Defense Department report released yesterday.
-
President Bush asserted peaceful measures couldn't disarm Iraq of the weapons he alleged it to have and launched a second Gulf War,[9] despite multiple dissenting opinions[10] and questions of integrity[11][12][13] about the underlying intelligence.[14] Later U.S.-led inspections agreed that Iraq had earlier abandoned its WMD programs, but asserted Iraq had an intention to pursue those programs if UN sanctions were ever lifted.[15] President Bush later said that the biggest regret of his presidency was "the intelligence failure" in Iraq,[16] while the Senate Intelligence Committee found in 2008 that his administration "misrepresented the intelligence and the threat from Iraq".[17]
So...what was the reason for this war?
Sigh. Guess the US will have to "re-invade" again.
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You don't show affection for the US military by sending them to fight a war based on lies.
President George W. Bush addresses the nation from the Oval Office, March 19, 2003, to announce the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom.[77] "The people of the United States and our friends and allies will not live at the mercy of an outlaw regime that threatens the peace with weapons of mass murder." The Senate committee found that many of the administration's pre-war statements about Iraqi WMD were not supported by the underlying intelligence.
Change you should believe in.
Mission Accomplished ?
boosh-worst President there could ever be.
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The first one should have never been sent.