BAGHDAD / Aswat al-Iraq: The Iraqi army's ground troops are ready to fill the vacuum that would follow the U.S. forces' withdrawal by the end of this month and until complete pullout from Iraq in late 2011, according to Commander General Ali Ghidan on Friday.
| Let's hope so, because Bambi sure isn't going to help you ... |
| The old Iraqi army was actually pretty good at taking care of little domestic problems. It just wasn't good for anything else. |
"The U.S. forces implemented the first part of the status of forces agreement (SOFA) by withdrawing troops from cities and districts in mid-2009 and now they are implementing the second part, that is the gradual reduction of troops to reach to only 50,000 by the end of August 2010," Ghidan told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.
He added that his forces will receive security and administrative tasks at the military bases occupied by the U.S. army outside cities and districts.
"The Iraqi ground troops' efficiency and abilities to carry out military missions continued to increase during the past years, in addition to performing other tasks without reliance on backing by the U.S. army for more than one and half years," said General Ghidan. |