Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon on left
Friday, May 11, 2007
AP via Fox
WASHINGTON — The U.S. commander in northern Iraq said Friday that he doesn't have enough troops for the mission in increasingly violent Diyala province.
Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon also said that Iraqi government officials are not moving fast enough to provide the "most powerful weapon" against insurgents — a government that works and supplies services for the people.
Mixon commands the area that includes Diyala province, north of Baghdad. It was a hotbed of the Sunni insurgency before the start of the Baghdad security crackdown and has worsened since militants fled there to avoid the increased U.S.-led operations started in the capital in February.
Mixon has already received extra troops and has increased attacks on militants. But he has asked Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno, the No. 2 commander in Iraq, for more.
"I laid out a plan for General Odierno on the numbers of forces that I would need," Mixon told Pentagon reporters by video conference from Iraq. "We have made progress ... we have taken terrain back from the enemy. General Odierno intends to give me additional forces as they become available."
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There are some 146,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. Initially, President Bush ordered an extra 21,500 combat troops to the country to help calm sectarian violence — mainly in Baghdad. An additional 7,000 or so will go in support positions.
The last of five extra brigades are to arrive by June.
Mixon has about 3,500 troops in Diyala and there are about 10,000 Iraqi soldiers and several thousand Iraqi police, with 3,000 more police approved but not yet hired and trained.
Mixon said Diyala's government is so ineffective at providing services that it could be described as nonfunctioning.
He also blamed national ministries in Baghdad, because the weak government hampers coalition efforts to make the country secure. Showing Iraqis that their government can provide for them "will be the most powerful weapon against this insurgency," Mixon said.
Both Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have visited Iraq since April and urged the Iraqi government to move faster on issues that could bring reconciliation in Iraq.
