It's not an increase therefore it must be a withdrawal

Headline news! Troop Withdrawals in Iraq!.

After playing word games for a couple of days, suddenly the day before Christmas Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld announced good news. "Troop Withdrawals in Iraq!"

In typical Rumsfeldian fashion, though, it's hard to tell what's really going on.

The total number of US troops in Iraq will be reduced by 7,000--from the current 160,000 to 153,000--but half of those will be moved just across the border to Kuwait and the rest won't be sent home but rather will be kept close by in case they are needed on short notice. Still, that's 7,000 moved out of Iraq. Get it? Troop Withdrawals in Iraq!

And, somehow or another, 7,000 troops who had been told they would soon be going to Iraq will now stay in the US. For them and their families this must seem like Troop Withdrawals in Iraq! (Coincidentally, guess which happy families will be featured over and over again on the Fox News shows.)

Still it's all a bit confusing because, no matter how you cut it, even after all the movement to and fro there will still be 15,000 more US troops in Iraq than the 138,000 that were there a year ago. But that's due, we're told, to the build-up of US troops before the Iraq elections (two, three, more of them) which were supposed to bring democracy and freedom to the Iraqi people followed by Troop Withdrawals in Iraq! but instead seem to have fueled even more violence requiring the continued presence of US troops in iraq.

Is there a pattern here? First violence increases in Iraq. Then we send in more US troops to restore order. The increased presence of US troops leads to even more violence which, of course, requires even more US troops.

US General Peter Pace seems to get the picture. Two days after Rumsfeld announced Troop Withdrawals in Iraq!, General Pace said that there really are no firm plans to withdraw troops. In fact, just the opposite, "the number of US troops in Iraq could increase not decrease," because "the enemy has a vote in this, and if they were to cause some kind of problems that required more troops, then we would do exactly what we've done in the past, which is give the commanders on the ground what they need. And in that case, you could see troop level go up."

Of course the "Troop Withdrawals in Iraq!" headline was never retracted.

Iraq Contingent May Grow if Attacks Persist - LA Times