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Small Troop Drawdown Will Leave 'Robust Force' for Iraq's Elections

February 27, 2009 7:00 PM

ABC News' Martha Raddatz reports: In a letter to the troops in Iraq, the top U.S. commander, Gen. Ray Odierno says that "following an initial drawdown over the next six months, our forces will remain at a robust level through the critical time leading up to and immediately following Iraq's national elections in late-2009/early-2010."

ABC News has learned from Defense Department officials that early indications are that the initial drawdown Gen. Odierno is referring to will consist of two brigade combat teams or the equivalent of 8,000-10,000 troops.

That small drawdown will leave the large "robust force" Odierno wants to have in place for the regional elections this summer and the national election in December, 2009.  It also means that a significant portion of the 142,000 troops currently in Iraq will remain in place the remainder of this year. 

These officials tell ABC News that the next series of combat troop drawdowns would begin in January-February of  2010, after the national election.  That would require a huge logistical undertaking to reduce force levels by today’s announced target date of August 31, 2010 to the 50,000 minimum.

ABC News has also learned that Gen. Odierno will receive a Stryker Brigade to replace the one diverted to Afghanistan just a week ago.  That means that he will continue to maintain the current level of two Stryker brigades in Iraq.  The light armored vehicles are favored by military commanders for their mobility as a quick reaction force while providing greater protection for the troops.   

The current Status of Forces Agreement requires all US forces to be out of Iraq by the end of 2011, though the possibility remains the agreement could be re-negotiated.  After the President’s speech today in Camp Lejeune,  Defense Secretary Robert Gates told reporters that while that possibility was just a hypothetical, "my own view would be that we should be prepared to have some very modest-sized presence for training and helping them with their new equipment and providing perhaps, intelligence support and so on beyond that.”  Gates has made similar comments prior to the finalization of the SOFA deal late last year.

Editor's Note:  Over the weekend, additional information led us to rework this article.  We have restored the original wording as additional reporting reconfirms the information posted Friday night.

Gen. Odierno will maintain a two-Stryker Brigade presence through the rest of this year even though a replacement Stryker Brigade had been redirected to Afghansitan.  The Pentagon's announcement Monday that the 4th Stryker BCT, 2nd Infantry Division will head to Iraq in the Fall means both brigades currently in Iraq will be replaced by Stryker Brigades.  In shorthand, the 4th SBCT/2nd ID  will replace the 1st SBCT/25th ID and the 3rd SBCT/2nd ID will the 56th National Guard Stryker Brigade.

February 27, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (11)

CIA Chief Provides Economic Intel Brief

February 25, 2009 10:22 PM

ABC News' Luis Martinez reports: Highlighting the potential impact the worldwide economic downturn may have on global security and foreign policy, new CIA Director Leon Panetta said today that the agency is now producing a new daily intelligence document for President Obama and other top officials that focuses on economic issues.

Panetta says the new intelligence product, known as the Economic Intelligence Brief, is intended to make sure that policymakers "aren't surprised by the implications of the worldwide economic crisis."

The first brief was presented to the White House this morning, after a request from the Obama administration, Panetta said.

He said the briefs would "cover overseas developments –- economic, political, leadership developments," as well as "the implications of those developments in terms of the U.S. economy."

The new intelligence brief is another sign of the Obama administration’s focus on economic issues. 

Since his first day in office, Obama has received daily briefings from his economic advisers that take place before the long-standard security briefing focused on the intelligence community's daily assessment, known as the Presidential Daily Brief.

In a wide-ranging session with reporters at CIA headquarters in McLean, Va., Panetta said the economic recession was having an impact on China and European countries and that there was particular concern for the economic stability of Argentina, Ecuador and Argentina.

With regards to the war on terror, Panetta said "nothing has changed" the CIA's efforts to go after terrorists "and nothing will change those efforts ... none of that has diminished and none of it will."

In a veiled reference to air strikes from CIA Predator drones in Pakistan's tribal border regions, Panetta said al Qaeda has suffered "key setbacks in recent months."  Without directly addressing the air strikes, Panetta referred to successful "operational efforts ... going after members of al Qaeda" that have the support of President Obama and are probably "the most effective weapon we have to try to disrupt al Qaeda right now."

Panetta would not provide details about reports that North Korea is preparing to launch a long-range missile, beyond noting Pyongyang's public statement that the country plans to launch a satellite in the near future. He said, however, that the agency would be paying "a great deal of attention" to the possibility of a missile launch. 

Much as he did during his swear-in ceremony last Thursday, Panetta pledged to provide "honest and straight" intelligence "not impacted by partisan views," a criticism of how the Bush administration handled intelligence in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003.

February 25, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (5)

Obama DOD Budget is $534 billion; War Supplement is $75.5 Billion

February 25, 2009 6:22 PM

ABC News' Luis Martinez reports: A Defense official confirms that the "topline" budget number for the Pentagon to be released tomorrow by the Office of Management and Budget will be about $534 billion. The full budget details will be provided in April. Last year, Congress appropriated $513 billion for the Defense Department's budget.

The Obama administration has expressed a desire to go away from the Bush administration's use of supplemental emergency bills to pay for the ongoing costs of the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Despite that, there will be two additional war supplemental requests released by the OMB tomorrow.  One of them will be to contine funding the costs of the wars for the second half of fiscal year 2009, Congress had already appropriated $65.9 billion for the first half of fiscal year 2009. The Defense official confirms that the second half of the fiscal year 2009 request will be for $75.5 billion.  That would bring the total war spending costs for fiscal year 2009 to $141.4 billion.

In a letter to Congress on Dec. 31, Defense Secretary Robert Gates estimated that this request might be $69.7 billion. That estimate did not take into account the addition of troops into Afghanistan. Last week, President Obama announced he would send an additional 17,000 troops to Afghanistan to boost the current force of 38,000 troops currently in Afghanistan.

The official confirms that OMB will also requst another supplemental bill to fund the ongoing operations in Iraq and Afghanistan for fiscal year 2010 which begins on October 1. That proposed request will be for $130 billion.

February 25, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (15)

Holder: U.S. Still Determined to Close Gitmo

February 25, 2009 4:55 PM

ABC News’ Jason Ryan reports:  Despite his recent observation that the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba is “well run,” Attorney General Eric Holder said the Obama administration is still determined to shut the facility down.

Holder, who visited the facility Monday, described his trip as "instructive,” and said that during his tours of the different detainee facilities, he “was impressed by the people who are presently running the camp” and that the facilities “are good ones.”

"But I think it does not in any way decrease our determination to close the facility, even though, as I said, I think it is being well run now," Holder said at a news conference at the Justice Department, announcing the results of a major offensive against a Mexican drug cartel. 

"Our determination to close it, I think, is rooted in the things that the President spoke about when he signed the executive order and is consistent with my testimony during my confirmation hearing."

Holder traveled to the facility with senior Justice Department lawyers and Matthew Olsen, whom he appointed last week to head the Guantanamo Detainee Review Task Force, the panel charged with evaluating the detainees' cases.

While at the facility, the attorney general met with military lawyers and guards and reviewed the charges and case histories of the detainees being held there. 

Asked to respond to a Reuters report that some abuse at Guantanamo has taken place since President Obama has ordered the detention facility Holder said, "I did not witness anything in -- when I was at Guantanamo that indicated people were getting in, I think, as you put it, last licks.”

“I did not witness any mistreatment of prisoners...What I saw was a very conscious attempt to conduct -- for these guards to conduct themselves in an appropriate way,” Holder continued.

On Thursday, several lawyers representing Guantanamo detainees are expected to send a letter to President Obama, urging him to intervene and stop the alleged abuse of about 20 of their clients.

Also on Wednesday, Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair said the facility has blunted the United States’ ability to deal with other countries.

"The damage it has done to [our] international reputation has made things more difficult for us….we don’t have blue chips we want trade in other areas," he told lawmakers on the House Intelligence Committee.

February 25, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (16)

Obama Likely to Announce Iraq Pullout This Week, Official Says

February 24, 2009 10:10 PM

ABC News' Martha Raddatz reports:

President Obama will likely announce a pullout of U.S. troops from Iraq later this week, according to a Defense Department official.

Obama has been given three plans by the current top U.S. commander in Iraq, Ray Odierno, for troop withdrawal -- 16 months, 19 months or 23 months. The official said it appears Obama is "trending" toward 19 months, although the decision is coming form Obama, not the Pentagon, the official said. While campaigning for President, then Sen.-Obama pledged to drawdown U.S. forces in Iraq within 16 months. But he was always careful to add that troop withdrawal needed to be done carefully.

A residual force would be left behind, somewhere in the neighborhood of 50,000 troops. Also, Obama must take up the big issue of whether to stop production of the F-22 aircraft. The fighter jet is not scheduled to be a part of the March 1 budget but will be part of a budget announcement at the end of March. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates does not like the F-22, but knows that if the U.S. cancels the aircraft it will mean tens of thousands of jobs lost.

February 24, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (16)

Navy Admiral Studies Prison Conditions at U.S. Detention Facility

February 23, 2009 6:51 PM

ABC News' Luis Martinez reports:

The U.S. Navy's number two admiral said Monday that the detention facility at Guantanamo meets the standards of humane treatment, but additional steps are needed to increase "socialization" of the men imprisoned there.

In a Pentagon briefing, Admiral Patrick Walsh said that over 13 days his review team conducted more than 100 interviews with camp personnel and met with about a dozen detainees to hear their take and look into some of their allegations of abuse. However, Walsh said his review team's mandate was to make sure the camp was currently in compliance and not to look at past incidents.

He said it was apparent to him that camp commanders had consistently gone "beyond the minimum standard in complying with Common Article 3" of the Geneva Conventions.

Walsh's team recommended ways to improve conditions at the detention facilities, mainly because his team brought "a fresh set of eyes and -- and what I hope would be a common-sense approach to a number of issues starting to play out after prolonged detention."

But he denied that the team's "recommendations are items that the department must pursue to satisfy Common Article 3." Rather, he said, "they are items that we view as consistent with the approach of the chain of command to continually enhance conditions of detention."

One of the team's recommendations was to enable greater socialization among the high-value detainees housed at Camp 7. The team found that even though current "socialization practices conform with Common Article 3... the team believes that, in certain camps, further socialization is essential to maintain humane treatment over time." This includes more "human-to-human contact, recreation opportunities with several detainees together, intellectual stimulation and group prayer."

Walsh feels that the mental health of the detainees should be part of the dialogue about "what it takes to be humane." He said his team reviewed records and found that 8 percent of the detainees were on mental health medications, a number substantially lower than the civilian population in the US. And though he didn't find statistics to back up his concerns about socialization, he asked if it wasn't prudent to "get in front of this" and recognize that practicing Islam calls for social interaction.

The panel also recommended using video recordings at the camps and interrogations to ensure that everything is on the up and up. Walsh says the recordings would "put everyone on notice in terms of accountability…. enhance accountability of guards and monitor their performance.

He cited how his team was able to disprove a detainee's allegations through a review of video recordings. Why hadn't they been used in the past? The Admiral cited technical limitations on storage capacity that have now been overcome.

February 23, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (6)

Police Move to Arrest Suspect in Chandra Levy Case

February 21, 2009 12:51 AM

ABC News'  Rhonda Schwartz, Imtiyaz Delawala and Pierre Thomas report:

Police investigating the 2001 “cold case” murder of Washington intern Chandra Levy plan to seek a warrant for the arrest of a convicted felon, currently serving jail time, who has emerged as the primary suspect in the Levy case.

The suspect, Ingmar Guandique, has been in jail since approximately July 2001 for two nonfatal attacks on women in the city's Rock Creek Park in Washington, D.C., where Levy's body was discovered in 2002.

Police hope to serve the warrant before Guandique is paroled.

Officially police are not commenting on the case, but a source inside the department told ABC News that D.C. metro Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier had contacted the Levy family to update them on developments.

"The Metropolitan Police Department has no information available for release in this ongoing investigation. This case generated numerous bits of information, which we continue to follow up on," police said in a statement.

Guandique attacked a woman two weeks after Chandra's disappearance in the middle of May 2001, and another in July. The women were jogging in Rock Creek Park when he "clotheslined" them and dragged them down a hill. There was a struggle, they escaped and he ultimately was caught and pleaded guilty.

Guandique is now serving a 10-year sentence at the U.S. Penitentiary-Victorville in Adelanto, Calif., and is eligible for parole in 2011. The FBI most likely wants to close the case before his parole date, Brad Garrett tells ABC News.

Guandique was the focus of the last three parts of a 12-part series on Levy's disappearance in the Washington Post metro section last year. He told the Post then that he had nothing to do with Levy's disappearance:

"Regarding the case of the girl, Chandra Levy: I don't know anything about that case. In 2001, the FBI went to see me when I was in the [D.C. jail]. That was when I learned about that girl," Guandique said. "Before that, I had never seen her and I don't understand the reason why the police started to suspect me. ... I have nothing to do with the death of that girl. I am innocent and I am not afraid of the police investigation."

After the Post series, D.C. and FBI cold-case squad detectives reexamined their evidence. The problem had always been a lack of conclusive physical evidence to tie Guandique to the murder. 

February 21, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (51)

South Korea Loves Hillary Clinton Too

February 20, 2009 1:41 PM

ABC News' Martha Raddatz reports from Seoul, South Korea: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton continued her whirlwind tour of Asia with a stop in Seoul, South Korea. And she continued to pour on the charm, too.

A day after appearing on a popular MTV-style show in Jakarta, Indonesia where she wooed the crowd with stories of conversations with President Obama, Clinton spoke to a group of college students at Ewha Womans University in Seoul.

The questions she faced weren't the staid, diplomatic ones she's used to.

Clinton was asked about her thoughts on love.

"Wow, I feel more like an advice columnist than a secretary of state today," Clinton said, drawing laughter from the audience.

What does she think about her daughter Chelsea?

"We could be here for hours!" she replied.

Watch the video HERE.

February 20, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (17)

U.S. to Host Afghan, Pakistani Foreign Ministers

February 19, 2009 10:03 PM

ABC News' Kirit Radia reports: Next week, the State Department will host the foreign ministers of Afghanistan and Pakistan in the Obama administration's first attempt to bring the sides together under its stated regional approach to the instability along their common border.

The foreign ministers’ trip to Washington was a result of Special Representative Richard Holbrooke's consultations in the region last week. He told PBS in an interview Wednesday that their visit is "a manifestation of a new, intense, engaged diplomacy designed to put Afghanistan and Pakistan into a larger regional context and move forward to engage other countries in the effort to stabilize this incredibly volatile region."

The two ministers will meet with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Holbrooke, as well as the interagency team headed by Bruce Reidel that is formulating the administration's policy review on the matter. That team met for the first time Wednesday and is expected to deliver its findings by late March. Pakistani Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani, the chief of staff of the Pakistani army and former head of the intelligence service, is also expected to make the trip.

Holbrooke told PBS he expects Indian officials to come to Washington in "a couple of weeks" -- again, part of the regional approach the Obama team hopes will finally solve the problems in the region.

Holbrooke also brushed aside suggestions that President Obama's recent call to his Afghan counterpart came too late and was a sign of displeasure with the Afghan leader.

"I really don't understand the criticism," he said.

Holbrooke also criticized the recent peace deal between Pakistan and Taliban militants in Pakistan’s Swat Valley, saying Pakistan had "ceded to the bad guys."

"We're troubled and confused, in a sense, about what happened in Swat, because it is not an encouraging trend.  Previous cease-fires have broken down," he told PBS.

In an interview with CNN late this afternoon, Holbrooke revealed he called Pakistan's President Asif Zardari today to voice his concerns about the peace deal in Swat.

"I am concerned, and I know that Secretary Clinton is and the president is, that this deal which is portrayed in the press as a truce does not turn into a surrender," said Holbrooke. "President Zardari has assured us this is not the case."

The call illustrates just how broad Holbrooke's mandate is, that he can pick up the phone and call Zardari himself.

Holbrooke told PBS yesterday the matter will also be pursued "at very high levels" with Pakistan's foreign minister when he is in Washington next week.

Asked how the Obama administration will define success in Afghanistan, Holbrooke replied: "The victory, as defined in purely military terms, is not achievable, and I cannot stress that too highly.  What we're looking for is the definition of our vital national security interests."

U.S. officials say Holbrooke isn't expected to re-visit the Pakistan-Afghanistan region for at least a few more weeks.

February 19, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (2)

Special Envoy Mitchell Returns to Mid-East in a Week

February 19, 2009 6:49 PM

ABC News' Kirit Radia reports: US Special Envoy to the Middle East George Mitchell will return to the region next week, his second trip since being appointed to the post last month.

According to US officials Mitchell's itinerary is still being finalized, but he is expected to leave early next week (perhaps Monday or Tuesday) and will attempt to make up stops he was unable to make last time.

Those stops include London (cancelled due to an unexpected blizzard) and Turkey (schedule conflicts). Mitchell will also try to visit Israel and the Palestinian Territories.

Other possible stops include visits to European capitals and he may make another stop in Saudi Arabia (a nod to the Arab Peace Initiative, parts of which President Obama has said have merit).

Mitchell is then expected join up with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Egypt to attend a Gaza donors conference in early March.

February 19, 2009 | Permalink | User Comments (0)