Pentagon Struggles to find Fresh Troops
The Bushists are playing a terrible game with the lives of our troops. Soldiers are essentially being asked to fight until they die or are maimed and can't fight any longer. And its all about not being blamed for losing the war in Iraq. It was the same mentality during the Vietnam war. Bush doesn't want to go down as a loser--which is what he is anyway:
Military leaders are struggling to choose Army units to stay in Iraq and Afghanistan longer or go there earlier than planned, but five years of war have made fresh troops harder to find.
Faced with a military buildup in Iraq that could drag into next year, Pentagon officials are trying to identify enough units to keep up to 20 brigade combat teams in Iraq. A brigade usually has about 3,500 troops.
The likely result will be extending the deployments of brigades scheduled to come home at the end of the summer, and sending others earlier than scheduled.