Special to WorldTribune.com
BAGHDAD — The United States has intensified its military withdrawal
from Iraq.
Officials said the U.S. military has increased the pace of pulling out
equipment from Iraq to Kuwait. They said the military, with 39,000 troops,
was closing bases, transferring combat platforms and logistics in both air
and ground transport.
“Now, we are getting between 25 and 50 vehicles each day and about 300
to 500 other pieces of equipment daily,” U.S. Army Lt. Michael Saslo,
assigned to removing military equipment at Camp Liberty, said. “So now it’s
the velocity of turn-in and pushing it out that is the challenge.”
On Oct. 20, the U.S. military closed U.S. Division-North, which oversaw
4,000 troops in northern Iraq. The division was responsible for U.S.
operations in seven provinces that bordered such countries as Iran, Syria
and Turkey.
Officials said the military retains 18 bases in Iraq, including several
in the north. They said the military was encouraging operations between the
regular Iraq Army and security forces of the autonomous Kurdistan region.
“Iraqi Security Forces and Peshmerga [Kurdish] forces having been working
together to provide security for the Iraqi people in the absence of a direct
U.S. presence,” U.S. military commander Gen. Lloyd Austin said.
Washington has sought to extend the U.S. military presence of several
thousand trainers beyond 2011. But the administration appeared resigned to
the prospect that Baghdad would not agree to any arrangement until after the
completion of the U.S. withdrawal.
“Once we’ve completed the reduction of the combat presence,” U.S.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said, “then I think we begin a process of
negotiating with them in order to determine
what will be the nature of that relationship, what kind of training do they
need, what kind of security needs to they have.”

  equipment from Iraq, Iraq, Kuwait, U.S. Army, U.S. picks up pace in withdrawal of troops