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A Daily Chronicle of Bush Administration Distortion November 7, 2003
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Government To Call More Troops One Week After Bush Says They're Not Needed



President Bush indicated just last week that additional U.S. troops would not be needed in Iraq, saying, "General Abizaid makes the decision as to whether or not he needs more troops... And he told me he does [have enough troops]."1 But Thursday, the Pentagon announced plans to temporarily increase troop levels by as many as 50,000 in Iraq before reducing total troop size in Iraq to 105,000 by next spring.2

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld echoed the President's assertion on Sunday, saying that troop levels have "come down from 150,000 to 130,000, and I suspect it will continue going down."3 Today's announcement included the news that 20,000 Marines will help fill the gap of departing Army troops, a step not taken since the Vietnam War.4 Senator John McCain said of the current administration strategy, "There does not appear to be a strategy behind our current force levels in Iraq other than to preserve the illusion that we have sufficient force levels in place to meet our objectives."5

The announcement came as the Iraqi Governing Council formally rejected the possibility that Turkey might deploy 10,000 Turkish troops in Iraq, which the Bush administration had hoped could bring relief to U.S. troops.6

In addition to the latest news on troop movements, the Pentagon has been moving in the past several weeks to fill the 16 percent of vacancies on local draft boards. The government last sought to fill all draft board positions in 1981 at a critical moment in the Cold War, shortly after Ronald Reagan took office.7 Secretary Rumsfeld dismissed the idea of reinstating the draft earlier this year, saying, "We're not going to reimplement a draft. There is no need for it at all."8

The draft has not been used since 1973, as the Vietnam War was winding down.

Sources:
  1. Presidential Press Conference, 10/28/03.
  2. "Number of troops in Iraq to expand," Boston Globe, 11/6/03.
  3. Meet the Press, 11/2/03.
  4. "Pentagon Says It Has Begun Alerting 43,000 for Iraq Duty," New York Times, 11/6/03.
  5. "Pentagon Orders Iraq Replacement Troops," Los Angeles Times, 11/6/03.
  6. "Iraqi Rejects Turkish Troops In Setback for U.S. Planners," Washington Post, 11/6/03.
  7. "Oiling up the draft machine?" Salon.com, 11/3/03.
  8. News Briefing, Defense Department, 1/7/03.



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