- the phased withdrawal of all combat troops [total in tens of thousands]
- the retention of counter-terrorism units [a few thousand]
- the retention of advisers to Iraqi army and police [5-20,000]
- force protection [tens of thousands]
The appearance is that Clinton, Obama and Edwards all want to "bring the troops home." The effect is to numb and demobilize anti-war opinion and, if one of these candidates becomes president, will cause a cycle of anger and disappointment.
The reality is that withdrawing all combat troops still would leave as as many as 100,000 American soldiers in Iraq indefinitely. Worst case, it will become like Central America in the 1970s. There will be a string of low-visibility battlefronts from Iraq to Pakistan to Afghanistan involving large numbers of US troops by 2009. This is "the long war" described by counterinsurgency theorists.
- Clinton , while pledging to withdraw combat troops, offers no timetable and will keep some combat troops and advisers in Iraq through her first term, and she leaves open the possibility of permanent bases for a longer period. Their purposes will be to fight al-Qaeda terrorism, train Iraqi forces, guard the oil, and protect the embassy.
- Obama will withdraw all combat troops on a 16-18 month schedule, and leave counter-terrorism units and advisers indefinitely but under narrower mandates than Clinton [he says he will pull them if the Iraqi factions don't reconcile, for example
- Edwards will pull all troops, combat and advisory, in a one-year period, though redeploying a force to Kuwait.
The failure of the media lies in not asking whether these withdrawal plans will leave a counterinsurgency plan in place, with thousands of US troops and billions in tax dollars, defending a repressive sectarian regime in Baghdad.
The media's moral failure is its collective decision not to report that under Petraeus' plan the number of Iraqis imprisoned without charges has doubled in the past year, and the number of US airstrikes has increased seven-fold. The future role of US advisers already is clear: to fight "al Qaeda in Mesopotamia" which is automatically described in every account as "foreign-controlled." That in addition to funding, training and arming both sides of the Shia-Sunni conflict [not to mention the Kurds]. The US role has been to stir up a witch's brew of violent factions, which justifies the permanent occupation. Worse, over 900 American troops were killed in Iraq last year while the Pentagon and media proclaimed military success.
For whatever reason, neither the candidates nor the media describe these distinctions clearly. The appearance is created that the US will withdraw from Iraq under a Democratic president, which is at best a half-truth.