"You have to have both combined," General Ray Odierno, the commander of US forces in Iraq, told a news conference.

He said success against the Iraqi branch of Al-Qaeda could not have been achieved solely with a "counter-terrorism" approach -- using a smaller elite force targeting key enemy leaders.

It was crucial also to have a "counter-insurgency" campaign involving a large ground force across the country providing security for the local population, he said.

"It takes a combination of both of these things to get after that," he said.

Although his comments were about Iraq, Odierno's observations on strategy go to the heart of an intense debate underway in the White House over the Afghan war, as President Barack Obama weighs sending in more US troops.

The debate tends to pit advocates of a counter-insurgency strategy -- a manpower-intensive approach with troops securing towns and villages -- against supporters of a more narrow "counter-terrorism" mission designed to target Al-Qaeda leaders without attempting to take on the wider Afghan insurgency.

Senior US military leaders support staying with the counter-insurgency strategy in Afghanistan, where the American contingent is already due to reach 68,000 by the end of the year.

"In order to effectively go after these elements, you have to have counter-insurgency operated by your conventional forces that then can be supplemented by counter-terrorism operations by your higher-end ... forces," Odierno said.

He said the US military had managed to "sever Al-Qaeda Iraq from mainstream Al Qaeda," making it difficult for militants to communicate with Al-Qaeda's leadership outside of the country.

Odierno, who was due to brief Obama on Iraq after the press conference, declined to offer his opinion when asked about Afghanistan strategy.

"I can't speak to Afghanistan," said Odierno, saying he had spent the last several years in Iraq.

"What I do know is what you have to do is do your assessment of the entire environment that you're operating in" and try to "figure out why violence is increasing," he said.

The NATO commander there, General Stanley McChrystal, had done that, he said.

With violence down dramatically in Iraq and Baghdad's security forces taking the lead, Odierno is under pressure to free up troops and resources for the Afghan mission.

Obama has set a deadline of August 2010 to withdraw all US combat troops from Iraq and leave behind a 50,000-strong advisory force. Under a security agreement with Baghdad, all US troops have to leave Iraq by the end of 2011.

Expressing cautious optimism about progress in Iraq, Odierno suggested he might start pulling troops out ahead of schedule depending on conditions after elections due in January.

He was less than precise about force levels over the next three months, saying there would be 110,000 to 120,000 troops in Iraq by the end of the year.

"There's still some other decision points that we could make to off-ramp some other units around the first of the year, and we're still taking a look at that."

The US force in Iraq has been reduced from about 143,500 troops at the start of 2009 to about 124,000, Odierno told lawmakers on Wednesday.

Share This Article With Planet Earth

del.icio.us	Digg	Reddit
YahooMyWeb	Google	Facebook

Related Links
Iraq: The first technology war of the 21st century

Memory Foam Mattress Review

SPACE MEDIA NETWORK PROMOTIONS Solar Energy Solutions Tempur-Pedic Mattress Comparison ... Newsletters :: SpaceDaily :: SpaceWar :: TerraDaily :: Energy Daily XML Feeds :: Space News :: Earth News :: War News :: Solar Energy News