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British pullout from Iraq on the cards?

Hasan Suroor

LONDON: A time-table for an early withdrawal of British troops from Iraq is reported to be under discussion ahead of a change of guard at Downing Street later this month.

Media reports on Sunday claimed that soon after he takes over as Prime Minister on June 27, Gordon Brown will be presented with the plans proposing a complete pull-out within 12 months, possibly by the end of this year. The plans are said to be based on an assessment that the British army is too stretched to continue fighting on two fronts — Iraq and Afghanistan — simultaneously. Political observers, however, see it as a move to help Mr. Brown distance himself from Tony Blair's unpopular policy under which British troops would stay on in Iraq until the "job'' is done and as long as the Iraqi Government needs them. Mr. Brown, who supported the Iraq invasion, is under growing pressure to apologise and bring the troops back. He has admitted that "mistakes'' were made but refused to commit himself to a policy shift beyond saying he would take a decision after visiting Iraq.

The Sunday Telegraph said the time-table would be presented to Mr. Brown "within weeks'' of his forming a government. "It is understood that ... .he will be told by defence chiefs that Britain should withdraw from Iraq in `quick order' and concentrate on fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan.''

A senior military official was quoted as saying Britain was "not physically capable of fighting wars in Afghanistan and Iraq at the same time''. "There is an agreed time-table, a glide path, which will see a complete unilateral withdrawal in 12 months,'' the official said.

claimed that plans drawn up by British commanders in Iraq envisaged a complete pull-out "by the end of the year.'' The plans, it said, highlighted the "danger'' of staying too long in the light of the increasing attacks on British troops in recent weeks.

Britain has a little more than 5,000 troops in Iraq and, last October, chief of the defence staff Richard Dannatt warned that their continued presence "exacerbates the security problems.''<137>

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