CIAO Focus, July/August 2007:



Troop Surge in Iraq







Shortly after President Bush announced his "surge" plan in January of this year, the United States began deploying 20,000 additional troops to Iraq. The last of those GIs arrived on June 15, bringing the total number of American troops in Iraq to around 155,000.







David Petraeus, the American general brought in to head the operation, is confident that the increased number of troops will quell the sectarian violence and root out insurgent groups, including Al Qa'ida, that oppose the U.S. occupation. At the same time, the Bush administration hopes to compel the Shi'ite-led government in Baghdad to implement political reforms that would help legitimize it in the eyes of Iraq's Sunni minority.







In the U.S., support for the surge is predictably divided along party lines with most Democrats opposing it and most Republicans backing the president. However, with next year's elections looming on the horizon, many Republican candidates have cautiously distanced themselves from the war, which is increasingly seen as a liability, while a handful of Democrats who don’t want to be seen as not supporting the troops have conceded that some military progress has been made in Iraq.







A recent Gallup poll reveals that seven in 10 Americans want most troops out of Iraq by April 2008. However, the same poll showed that 55 percent thought that General Petraeus should be allowed to submit his report on the surge's progress before Congress takes further action.