What the Commanders Say

Why is Barack hedging on his commitment to blindly withdraw troops from Iraq without regard for events in Iraq? The answer can be found, as Martha Raddatz has discovered, by talking to the commanders on the ground.

Whatever nuance Barack Obama is now adding to his Iraq withdrawal strategy, the core plan on his Web site is as plain as day: Obama would "immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months."

A little analytical coverage of this underlying premise of Barack's candidacy is long overdue.

It is a plan that, no doubt, helped Obama get his party's nomination, but one that may prove difficult if he is elected president.

I've been telling you for a long time that the plan isn't workable, being a political plan not a tactical one. But Raddatz asks Commanders in Iraq if they think its a workable idea.

"Instead of any time-based approach to any decision for withdrawal, it's got to be conditions-based, with the starting point being an intelligence analysis of what might be here today, and what might lie ahead in the future. I still think we still have work that remains to be done before I can really answer that question," (Sadr City based Maj. Gen. Jeffrey) Hammond said when asked how he would feel about an order to start drawing down two combat brigades a month.

What would you expect them to say, though? Essentially what you're asking is, "What do you say we withdraw willy-nilly and see if World War III results?"

Capt. Jeremy Ussery, a West Point graduate on his third deployment... added, "You can't put a timetable on it -- it's events-based."

And then there's the challenge of how quickly you can actually get troops, and equipment, out. A couple of brigades a month can be drawn down okay, but getting the equipment out with them is a long, slow process.

And 90 percent of the equipment would have to be moved by ground through the Iraqi war zone, to the port in Kuwait, where it must all be cleaned and inspected and prepared for shipment. This is a place with frequent dust storms, limited port facilities and limited numbers of wash racks.

In other words, Barack's plan was always DOA. Which is why, with the nomination secured, he his trying to pretend that his absolute commitment to get the troops out in 16 months was always conditional.