Escalation in Afghanistan Could Leave Few Brigades in Reserve (We Are Out of Troops!)

[tekisui]

Source: Washington Independent

If President Obama orders an additional 30,000 to 40,000 troops to Afghanistan, he will be deploying practically every available U.S. Army brigade to war, leaving few units in reserve in case of an unforeseen emergency and further stressing a force that has seen repeated combat deployments since 2002.

According to information compiled by the U.S. Army for The Washington Independent about the deployment status of active-duty and National Guard Army brigades, as of December 2009, there will be about 50,600 active-duty soldiers, serving in 14 combat brigades, and as many as 24,000 National Guard soldiers available for deployment. All other soldiers and National Guardsmen will either be deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan already or ineligible to deploy while they rest from a previous deployment.

Obama is expected to announce a decision on an escalation of troop levels for Afghanistan shortly after returning from his trip to Asia on Friday, which would be the second such escalation of his young presidency. That decision follows a request issued in September from Gen. Stanley McChrystal, commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, in which McChrystal delivered the Obama administration with a palette of different troop-level options to turn around a faltering war effort. While White House officials have cautioned reporters that Obama has made no final choice on the size of a troop increase, a widely re-reported McClatchy story claimed that the administration was likely to send 34,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, which would raise U.S. troop levels in the eight-year war to an all-time high of 102,000. It is likely that Obama would include members of the other military services, especially the Marines, in any troop increase, but the vast majority of any new troop complement will come from the Army.

The shortage of available combat brigades means that an escalation of between 30,000 and 40,000 troops is “not realistic,” said Lawrence Korb, a former senior Pentagon official in the Reagan administration who now studies defense issues for the liberal Center for American Progress. To send practically all available soldiers into one of the two wars would leave the U.S. with “no reserve in case you had a problem in Korea.”

more: http://washingtonindependent.com/68174/army-data-shows-contraints-on-troop-increase-potential
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Related:
Odierno: No Major Iraq Troop Withdrawals Before April

Buried at the end of a New York Times piece is this rather significant declaration from Gen. Raymond Odierno, commander of U.S. troops in Iraq:

Gen. Ray Odierno, the commanding general of United States forces, said Wednesday that he was still hopeful elections would be held on time, but he added that the military could adapt if there was a delay.

“What I believe I have is flexibility,” he said, adding that significant reductions in troops were not scheduled until April or May.

April or May? That has real consequences for any escalation of troops in Afghanistan. As I report today, there will be practically no undeployed available combat brigades if President Obama goes with a 30,000-40,000 troop increase. It’s not like you can just pluck a brigade from Iraq and send it to Afghanistan. Soldiers get at least 12 months of so-called “dwell time” between deployments. But Odierno’s schedule means that combat brigades leaving Iraq won’t be until at least April 2011 for Afghanistan, which is a major issue for sustaining an escalation — not a temporary “surge” that lasts for one deployment — in that war, something Gen. Stanley McChrystal has suggested is necessary.

The combat mission in Iraq ends in August 2010 and Odierno has said troop levels will decline to 50,000. But he certainly is backloading the drawdown as much as possible. Where’s Gen. David Petraeus on this? As head of U.S. Central Command, he’s both Odierno’s boss and McChrystal’s boss, and deconflicting the needs of both commanders is one of his primary responsibilities.

http://washingtonindependent.com/68262/odierno-no-major-iraq-troop-withdrawals-before-april

[dysfunctional press]

1. the solution is obvious...

more military spending, and further erode the economy, forcing more serfs into military serf-ice.

[amandabeech]

2. This is just the time that Kim Jong Il should act up.

There would be no troops available to reinforce our men and women there. Kim appears to be an unbalanced, out-of-touch individual surrounded by military crazies. That bunch may not sit there forever. What other spots might become hot and out of control? Georgia? Our supposed ally Canada is pulling its troops out of Afghanistan. The Brits, too. Will they cover for us in other hot spots? I think not.

Two key points from the articles:

1. We deploy light units (infantry and no tanks and big trucks, essentially) in Afghanistan. Two of the units that will be ready later are heavy divisions which ordinarily would not be going to Afghanistan. We are unable to maintain even the proper mix of types of units.

2. Obama still may want 102,000 new army troops. Remember, he talked about this in the campaign. How are we to pay for them? Perhaps, more importantly, who will go? Unemployed young and not so young men (up to 41, I think) and women?

We keep shipping our jobs overseas and shipping some of the people who's jobs are going overseas and ship them overseas, too. Except they are going to war. How in the world can we justify this?

P.S. We can't even make enough ammo to keep our stores and our military stocked at the same time. What a f*(@#$g mess.

[tekisui]

3. Kick, an escalation in Afghanistan would leave us vulnerable.

[WilliamPitt]

4. We've been out of troops for about four years now.

5,000 killed + 50,000 wounded is half our combat strength.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

5. Or, congress could cut off the funding for the lost war.

But, of course, they won't because that would cut off their funding from the MIC lobbyists.