Iraq exit in ’11 a go, general says

WASHINGTON — Baghdad’s political troubles won’t keep American troops from leaving the country as planned at the end of 2011, the military’s top commander in Iraq said Wednesday.

Gen. Raymond Odierno said the Iraqi security forces are doing much of the work already and security has improved significantly since 2006 when an “almost civil war” gripped the nation.

Odierno said U.S. forces haven’t needed to conduct airstrikes in at least six months and Americans are mostly operating as advisers to Iraqi forces. Al-Qaida fighters in Iraq have been cut off from their leadership in Pakistan, he said.

“There has been steady, deliberate progress across all lines,” Odierno said. “There’s clearly more to do, but a new base line has been established.”

Iraq’s political parties have been unable to form a new government since March, when elections failed to produce a clear-cut winner.

Former premier Ayad Allawi, who heads the heavily Sunni-backed Iraqiya coalition, won 91 seats compared with 89 for Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s coalition.But neither won the 163-seat majority necessary to govern.

Odierno said Wednesday that he would be concerned if the political issue isn’t resolved by October.

“They will get there. Whether it happens next week or two months from now, I don’t know yet,” he said.

There are 70,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, fewer than half the total of a year ago. The number is expected to drop to 50,000 by Sept. 1.

Odierno said it is likely that 50,000 troops will stay in Iraq through summer 2011, when the U.S. begins drawing down to meet President Barack Obama’s requirement that all troops are gone by the end of that year.

Odierno said a major concern in the months to come will be protecting the Sons of Iraq, the Sunni tribesmen credited with turning the war around after they revolted against al-Qaida.

Odierno promised that the U.S., working through the Iraqi government, “will ensure that the Sons of Iraq program stays vibrant inside of Iraq.”

So far, the U.S. has turned over some 500 bases to the Iraqis. The U.S. equipment used during the war has either been sent back to the United States or is en route to Afghanistan, he said.

BLASTS KILL 15 IRAQIS, 1 GI

In Iraq, a car bomb outside a Shiite mosque in a village north of Baghdad killed 15 people Wednesday, the third deadly attack in the region in as many days, while a U.S. soldier was killed in a separate bombing in the same province, Iraqi officials and the U.S. military said.

The blast in a shopping area in the village of Abu Sayda also left 21 wounded, Ghalib al-Karkhi, a police spokesman in Diyala province, said.

A hospital official speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media confirmed the casualty figures.

The U.S. soldier, who was not identified pending notification of next of kin, was killed by a roadside bomb that struck the American’s vehicle while traveling through Diyala, the U.S. military said in a statement. The military said the soldier was treated at the scene before being evacuated to a U.S. military hospital in Balad.

5 GOVERNORS SEE PROGRESS

Five U.S. governors visiting Iraq said Wednesday that conditions have improved, with Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon pronouncing Obama’s goal of reducing U.S. forces to 50,000 troops by Sept. 1 achievable.

Also on the trip were Govs. Deval Patrick of Massachusetts, Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, Mike Rounds of South Dakota and Jim Douglas of Vermont. Nixon said Lt. Gen. Kenneth Hunzeker, deputy commander of U.S. forces in Iraq and the commander responsible for the drawdown, briefed them on the reduction in forces.

“It’s my sense that the United States will clearly meet the goal to get down to 50,000 troops by Sept. 1,” said Nixon, a Democrat.

“At the same time we’re doing that, the country is getting safer and there have been fewer security incidents.”

Pawlenty and Rounds also noted improving conditions.

Pawlenty, a potential GOP presidential candidate making his fifth trip to Iraq, said “dramatic, significant, positive progress” has been made since 2006 and 2007.

Information for this article was contributed by Mazin Yahya, Martiga Lohn, David Lieb, Dirk Lammers and Glen Johnson of The Associated Press.