Great Debates is the place for the philosophy portion of this question, but I seek hard answers so I’m in here.
Let us just say that tomorrow morning, Friday, May 11th, 2007 all troop activity was immediately ceased. The decision was made to withdraw all troops and support personnel immediately. That’s it, party over.
Considering the numbers involved, both human and in support material, how long would it take to execute a quick but safe and orderly withdrawl from Iraq ?
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Wouldn’t it be easier to just convert it all as part of a “Lend Lease” kind of program and leave it all there? The soldiers would be given an option to either come home or be granted work visas by the Iraqi government where they could be paid military consultants.
I know, smart ass answer. I’m not serious at all. I don’t know how long it would take but it would not be fast enough.
And when you say “all troop activity” are you referring to just Iraq or do you mean Afghanistan as well? While I believe that Iraq is a clusterfuck I don’t think we should leave Afghanistan. Our presence there has been overshadowed by Baghdad Bush’s desert adventure but I think we need to continue our work as part of The War Against Terror ™. I think it would be a mistake to pull out of the TWAT too soon.
So things to consider would be how quickly we can dismantle the semi-permanent command posts and such, what is our carrying capacity for troops and equipment in both cargo planes and ships, and how long to get everything shipped back.
I’d be shocked if we could mobilize that much stuff in under a month.
Even that is optimistic. Six months to a year.
It’ll almost surely be a transitional thing. Turning over areas of responsibility and assets to the Iraqi army. A year would be very fast. There are so many variables, mostly political, but I’d guess 2-3 years.
How long did it take to get in? The invasion took place March 20, 2003. But weren’t several months involved in the buildup?
And that was with a smaller number of troops and equipment than is now being used during the surge. Plus, getting out safely seems a lot dicer that the getting in part.
You could get all the troops out very quickly.
A couple of weeks if that, if that is what you wanted.
If the goal was to only move soldiers out of the war-zone.
Everything else would take months, and the troops would be required to organise its removal.
Well, how long would it take to get our troops out of there alone? Or basically, get them out and all of their dangerous toys so as not to make matters even worse. Wouldn’t want to leave all of those tanks and such lying around.
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Thank you for keeping this civil. Please continue to do so.
There is no factual answer, only (informed) speculation. Therefore this belongs in IMHO.
Withdrawing it there. Only took me about 30 seconds.
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To the contrary, if the goal is leave the Iraqi forces in a position to effectively fight the insurgents, we will have to leave it all, and ship more over there besides. Look at it this way; the greatest army in the world, the best trained and the best equipped, is fighting a stalemate war of attrition. What possible hope do the Iraqi forces have without all of our technology?
But what chance do the Iraqis have WITH all our equipment? What good has it done us? All it has done is allow our soldiers to protect themselves: it has not made any real progress in creating a civil society and a functioning government.
I’ve heard that it would need about a year to get it all out.
Shades of 1975. 
If the American soldiers left behind everything they couldn’t carry, and hopped into or onto every available Humvee, tank and transport vehicle, and fled for the Kuwaiti border, they could all be out in a few days. Kind of like a reverse Gulf War I scenario.
Won’t happen, though.
Well okay, what about just getting it all back to Kuwait? If we decided to go that route
I’m not sure of your point? Certainly Kuwait is in our debt as a result of the 1st Gulf War, but the current Bush administration has totally ignored diplomacy in the M.E. in their execution of this “war”. Even Kuwait’s debt to us has it’s limits.
What are you suggesting? That we observe the anarchy from a nearby observaton point? To what end? Or, are you suggestion that we keep U.S. forces at the ready, in Kuwait, to do what? Go back in and wind up in the same position we’re in now?
We are at a point of stalemate. We’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t. The responsibility for this belongs to G.W. Bush and those people he chose to staff his cabinet.
The solution to this situation lies in the Isreali/Palestinian difference, where it was before the invasion of Iraq. The answer lies in solving one difference at a time, through diplomacy. This administration has only suceeded in complicating things and costing thousands of lives and billons of dallars, to no end.
My absolute WAG is that an** orderly ** “just quit and leave” withdrawal could take about of a year – IF the Iraqi factions have the courtesy to stop hitting the US/UK forces while the withdrawal is in progress. At best 6 mos.+ to be off country and back to forward staging areas, and about as much to have everyone “home”, whether “home” is Fort Hood or Okinawa. And neither 100% everyone could or should leave, nor everything just be left behind for the Iraqi army, as there are some things they just could not use, some technology we’re not interested in transferring, some systems they could not hope to set up, maintain or operate w/o a large contingent of “advisors” . (For one thing, the new Iraqi military (or rather what there is that passes for it) as far as I know has NO real air cover of its own, and even in counterinsurgency that helps a lot)
IMO whoever is the next Prez, his/her “realistically optimist” goal would have to be substantial withdrawal w/o major collapse before election 2010, almost complete before election 2012, and no collapse until after Jan. 2013.
No man, I wasn’t suggesting any of that at all. The only reason I mentioned Kuwait was to simply make it as short as possible to get out of the country. I mentioned that because I felt it would be a lot quicker and mean essentially the same, since they’d be out of Iraq. Obviously once they got to Kuwait, they could be a bit more organized about going home. Kuwait for me there was a staging point in the withdrawal. Chill
**JRDelerious ** raises a good point – if the bad guys left our guys alone, just happy to see 'em go, it’d take a lot less time; my fear, however, is that the thugs and losers among the locals wouldn’t be able to resist the targets. And our guys would be very attractive targets if they were busily dismantling the U.S. infrastructure rather than hunkered down inside it.
Does anyone have a take on whether Kuwait would be used as a “de-staging” area? Anybody know if the Kuwaitis still like us enough to let us use their ports for shipping out? I never really gave it much thought.
I disagree. If they are unharassed, they take their own sweet time leaving. If they ae under assault, they are evacuating, or retreating, and they are hauling ass.
However, I haven’t been in the military, and this is a WAG which I do not claim to know as a fact.