UK troops in Iraq 'for years'

[Darranar]

British troops are likely to remain in Iraq for several years after the planned 1 July transfer of sovereignty to an interim Iraqi governing council.

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said on Monday UK troops would remain to prevent a "security vacuum".

Speaking on BBC radio a day after a surprise visit to Iraq by Prime Minister Tony Blair, Straw said he could not give an "exact timescale" for the withdrawal of British forces.

"I can't say whether it is going to be 2006, 2007," he said, adding that in any event, "it is not going to be months".

Al Jazeera

[kalian]

1. This was also reported by the BBC....

don't have the link, but I did recall reading about this.
This means that the US troops will be stuck doing their imperial
work for quite sometime as well...

[Gingersnap]

2. Maybe, just maybe the poodle is biting back

this statement--which runs so counter to what soldiers of any nationality want to hear, and particuarly counter to what Rumsfield et al have been claiming--combined with the Freudian slip about Weapons of Mass Distraction, makes me hopeful that the poodle is aiming to bite his master. Probably just in minor ways that will make Bush's re-election less likely. Of course, we can always dream that he will really stand up to them, but I doubt it. I think he is disillusioned with the cowboy, but still tethered to him in some way the rest of us cannot understand (and most importantly, to the US now). I think he's looking for a new master.