Never underestimate the power of job security:

If this Martha Raddatz piece at ABC News is any indication, the military doesn't intend to keep a low profile in this year's presidential election. In fact, they seem to be pretty loudly determined to make clear that they don't like Barack Obama's withdrawal plan one bit:

We spent a day with Maj. Gen. Jeffery Hammond in Sadr City...."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."

....Asked if he considered it dangerous to pull out if the withdrawal is not based on "conditions," Hammond said, "It's very dangerous. I'll speak for the coalition forces, men and women of character and moral courage; we have a mission, and it's not until the mission is done that I can look my leader in the eye and say, 'Sir, Ma'am, mission accomplished,' and I think it is dangerous to leave anything a little early."Lt. Gen. Lloyd Austin, who is the operational commander of all U.S. forces in Iraq, says he has seen things improve significantly here.

As for Obama's stated plan to bring home the troops within 16 months, Austin said, "I'd have to see the entire plan. I'd have to understand the strategic objectives of the leadership, and based on those strategic objectives, come up with operational objectives. It's very difficult to comment on one way or the other, whether one plan would work or one plan wouldn't work. Right now, we are helping the Iraqis achieve sustainable security, and helping them to increase the capability of the Iraqi security forces, and we are making great progress along those lines."

On the streets of Baghdad, where a suicide bomber had struck just days before, Capt. Josh West told us he wants to finish the mission, and that any further drawdown has to be based on conditions on the ground.

"If we pull out of here too early, it's going to establish a vacuum of power that violent criminal groups will be able to fill once we leave," West said.

Capt. Jeremy Ussery, a West Point graduate on his third deployment, pointed to his heavy body armor as we walked in the 120-degree heat, saying, "The same people keep coming back because we want to see Iraq succeed, that's what we want. I don't want my kids, that hopefully will join the military, my notional children, to have to come back to Iraq 30 years from now and wear this."

But Ussery added, "You can't put a timetable on it -- it's events-based."

I can't believe these political cocksuckers are throwing troops under the bus for promotions.

tags: officers  obama  iraq  withdrawal  

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