- WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon
last night called up more troops, including thousands of reserves, to prepare
for service in Iraq but said it planned to cut overall forces by 30,000
by next May.
-
- General Peter Pace, vice-chairman of the Joint Chiefs
of Staff, said yesterday that US forces in Iraq would be reduced to 100,000
by May. Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, had previously shied away
from giving precise figures for troop deployment in Iraq.
-
- The new rotation reflects the contradictory pressures
on the Bush administration as it seeks to bring American soldiers home
while fighting an increasingly deadly insurgency in Iraq.
-
- Speaking before the House armed services committee, Gen
Pace did not give figures for troops being called up as of last night but
said: "It does include a call-up of reserves. It does include the
Navy and Air Force with their capabilities to participate."
-
- The 2004 deployment will involve a new mix of troops,
with Marines being sent back in for the first time since September.
-
- Gen Pace's remarks came as the Congressional Budget Office
provided new evidence of the strain Iraqi operations were placing on US
forces.
-
- The CBO said the US army would not be able to sustain
force levels in Iraq beyond next spring unless it extended the tour of
duty of its active units to more than a year.
-
- The Pentagon's decision this summer to extend the tour
of duty in Iraq to a full year had already provoked strong criticism.
-
- Douglas HoltzEakin, director of the CBO, told the committee
yesterday that "the active army would be unable to sustain an occupation
force of the present size beyond March 2004 if it chose not to keep individual
units deployed to Iraq for longer than one year without relief".
-
- The CBO said the army did not have enough active component
forces "to simultaneously maintain the occupation at its current size,
limit deployments to one year, and sustain all of its other commitments"
- as the Pentagon had planned.
-
- The analysis comes amid growing concerns about the US
military's ability to sustain its high levels of troops abroad. More than
300,000 US forces have been called up since October 2001. There are still
more than 190,000 troops, including 60,000 reservists, on active duty today.
-
- Nearly 60 members of the committee, including Duncan
Hunter, its chairman, have signed a letter to Mr Rumsfeld, asking him to
bolster troop strength by two divisions.
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- © Copyright The Financial Times Ltd 2003.
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