Australia plans to bring home by June most of the 2,000 troops it sent to join the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq, Prime Minister John Howard said. Two ships, the Anzac and the Darwin, will return to Australia by the end of May, followed by the 14 FA/18 Hornet warplanes and the regiment of 150 special forces troops, or SAS, Howard told Australian Broadcasting Corp. radio. ``Those forces that were particularly at the sharp end of the conflict, and I'm thinking of the SAS and the Hornets, there is no need to keep them there any longer,'' he said, adding that some troops would remain during a ``transitional phase.'' Also leaving are ``some of the special force combat support elements and also the naval clearance diving team,'' he said.
Thanks to all these great soldiers!
The Australian forces have suffered no casualties yet in the fighting. Howard's government has said it will send military air traffic controllers to Iraq to help the flow of humanitarian aid and a team of chemical weapons experts to help hunt down Saddam Hussein's stocks of weapons of mass destruction.
Howard hangs in there and keeps doing useful things to help us. It's why you know you can count on the Aussies.
Howard's decision to send forces sparked mass protests across the country, with hundreds of thousands attending peace rallies in major cities in February to jump up and down and make faces and walk on stilts, but numbers at anti-war demonstrations have since dwindled to tens of thousands and Howard's popularity as prime minister has soared.
That usually happens when you're vindicated for taking a principaled stand. |