US Bugging Out of Iraq By 2007? Not So Fast

You've really got to wonder where the media gets some of its stories. Considering that the sources are unnamed ministry of defense officials, you've got to take these statements with a grain of salt. If this was an official position, someone would attach their name to the statements. It could be idle gossip or speculation, or even rumormongering despite the fact that the government's official position is that there will be no timetable for withdrawal.

The U.S. military in Iraq said on Sunday media reports that America and Britain planned to pull all troops out of Iraq by spring 2007 were "completely false," reiterating that there was no timetable for withdrawal.

Two British newspapers reported on Sunday that the pull-out plan followed an acceptance by the two governments that the presence of foreign troops in Iraq was now an obstacle to securing peace.

But a spokesman for the U.S. military in Iraq reiterated previous statements by U.S. and Iraqi officials that foreign troops would be gradually withdrawn from the country once Iraqi security forces were capable of guaranteeing security.

"This news report on a withdrawal of forces within a set timeframe is completely false," Lieutenant Colonel Barry Johnson said of the stories in Britain's Sunday Telegraph and Sunday Mirror, which quoted unnamed senior defense ministry sources.

Everyone has an agenda here. Democrats and Leftists in the US want the US out of Iraq, and the sooner the better because they don't want to see success in Iraq. Many consider the Iraq campaign to be a failure, despite all the facts to the contrary - free elections and elimination of a genocidal dictator who never gave up his dreams for WMD. So, they'll latch on to the reports that the US is preparing to bug out of Iraq in 2007.

The facts on the ground should determine this, not some politicized reporting. The Iraqi security forces have to be capable of dealing with the situation, and they are doing a far better job than the media acknowledges.

Some of those on the Left have also latched onto polling from Zogby claiming that many US troops want to get out of Iraq (72%). However, it looks like Zogby either got punked, or failed basic internal controls. Greyhawk studied the poll and found that the length of service by days and the tours of service do not match up. He also notes that the media is continuing to spin the body count resulting from the Golden Dome attack.

UPDATE:
Rep. John Murtha (D-PA) was on Face the Nation this morning and was up to his usual tricks. So was Face the Nation. Gateway Pundit has the breakdown. It isn't pretty. For Murtha and his followers and fellow travellers, that is.

Others blogging on Murtha's comments: Astute Blogger, who notes that sectarian violence between Sunni and Shi'a has always been an undercurrent in Middle East politics:

The transnational jihadoterrorists hate - and would commit genocide against - ALL non-Muslims and ALL "non-radical Muslims" - favoring ONLY the Wahhabist/Salafist/Qutubists strain of Islam. Because the political and religious leaders of Iraq's two largest groups - the Kurds and the Shias - realize that this recent uptick in sectarian violence is merely the result of the incitement by the transnational jihadoterrorists, they will actively take actions to prevent a sectarian civil war from breaking out. The attack in Sammarra has therefore actually had the effect of STRENGTHENING federalism in Iraq. SO: Al Qaeda has failed again. They must be getting very frustrated and desperate; they must be asking themselves, "If blowing up one of the holiest Shia mosques doesn't create widespread violent chaos, then what can?"

That is as strong a rebuttal of Murtha's position as any.

Meanwhile, Right Wing Nuthouse thinks the bugout reports were a trial balloon. Quite possible. In the comments, Rick notes that the papers that the information was leaked to are generally considered right-leaning, and that the editors had to vet the articles and whoever provided the information to the papers had to believe that it was true.