Baghdad may need more U.S. troops, general says

The top U.S. military commander in Iraq said Tuesday that more American troops may be needed in the capital to quell raging sectarian violence.

Speaking at a rare news conference, Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr. also said it would take longer than previously thought for Iraqi troops to fully provide adequate security across the war-scarred nation.

“It’s going to take another 12 to 18 months or so” to reach that goal, Casey said, repeating an estimate he made more than a month ago.

The news conference was another in a series of appearances by military commanders and Bush administration officials seeking to counter increasingly negative perceptions of the Iraq conflict as violence has escalated and U.S. casualties have risen to the highest rate this year, just weeks before crucial congressional elections.

In Washington, President Bush’s national security advisor said Iraqis had made progress, but to end the violence and instability, “they have to do more and they’ve got to do it faster.”

Stephen J. Hadley, in an interview with National Public Radio, added that it was unlikely Iraq would stabilize before the end of Bush’s presidency in 2009, even though it was “moving toward” democracy.

“Is there going to be peace? Is it going to be the end of any violence? Of course not. This violence is going to go on for a long time,” Hadley said. “You know, it takes a long time for these things to get completely out of the system.”

In October, U.S. and Iraqi forces have come under increased attack, with at least 90 U.S. troops killed, the highest American monthly death toll this year. And 300 Iraqi troops were killed during the just-completed holy month of Ramadan, Casey said. Most U.S. and Iraqi deaths have been in Baghdad.

The war in Iraq is a central issue in the Nov. 7 election in the U.S., and the Bush administration has been keen to play down any shift in Iraq policy.

But Bush has dropped the refrain that the United States will “stay the course” in Iraq, White House Press Secretary Tony Snow confirmed Monday. “He stopped using it,” Snow said, suggesting that the phrase left the impression that the administration was not adjusting to conditions in Iraq.

Last week, U.S. Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell IV described the violence in the capital as “disheartening” and suggested that the military was recasting its strategy.

Military officials have previously described the strategy in Baghdad as “clear, hold and build.” Though the U.S. military is able to clear neighborhoods of insurgents, holding and building have proved more problematic.

“Do we need more troops to do that? Maybe,” Casey said.

“If we do, I’ll ask for the troops we need, both coalition and Iraqis.”

There are 147,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, and Casey acknowledged that he had first projected a significant troop reduction this year. But by late June, he said, it became clear that Iraqi forces were not yet adequately prepared.

Administration critics said Tuesday that what was needed was a change of strategy, rather than a change in the estimated time to train Iraqi troops.

“There is no reason to think that doing the same old, same old for another 18 months will produce any different results than it has the past 3 1/2 years,” said Rand Beers, a former staff member on Bush’s National Security Council who resigned before the Iraq war.

At a Pentagon news conference Tuesday, Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, acknowledged that Casey’s assessment might be viewed as further delay. But he is “making fresh assessments each time” as part of a constant reevaluation of Iraqi troop capabilities, Pace said.

Also speaking at the Baghdad news conference, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, emphasized a political timetable, saying the Iraqi government had agreed to begin resolving fundamental disputes through a “national compact.”

Iraqi politicians differ on key issues, including revenue sharing, de-Baathification and disarming militias and insurgents.

“Iraqi officials have agreed to a timeline for making these difficult decisions,” Khalilzad said without giving specifics.

It was also unclear what would happen if Iraqi politicians failed to meet such a timeline.

As Khalilzad was taking a question about whether the U.S. mission in Iraq had failed, the power went out at the news conference inside the heavily secured Green Zone.

Khalilzad continued to speak in the dark but was inaudible without working microphones.

For the last year, Khalilzad and other U.S. officials have been pushing to disarm the mainly Shiite militias and resolve the conflict over oil revenue. Iraqi politicians have created numerous committees and reconciliation initiatives but have made little progress.

Pace said U.S. and Iraqi officials had not agreed on timetables for disbanding militias and distributing oil revenue. But he said U.S. officials were continuing to work with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki on such goals.

Since the election of the Shiite-led government in December, Shiite militias have become increasingly powerful.

“This ambassador has no right to force conditions or give the government a timetable,” said Sahib Amry, a Najaf representative of the anti-American cleric Muqtada Sadr, who controls 30 seats in parliament and nominally leads the largest Shiite militia in Iraq.

Maliki, also a Shiite, relies on Sadr’s support and has on several occasions thwarted American efforts to go after Sadr’s Al Mahdi army, frustrating U.S. commanders.

Privately, U.S. military officials now say that the Al Mahdi army is responsible for most attacks against U.S. troops, but the extent of Sadr’s control over the group is unclear.

This month, American troops arrested Sheik Mazen Saedi, who is affiliated with Sadr, suspecting he was involved in killings and bomb-making. But Maliki quickly intervened, securing his release.

“After checking to make sure we had no information that he had anything to do with attacking coalition forces, I made the call in support of the prime minister, and my assessment was [that] operational risk was far exceeded by potential strategic payoff,” Casey said Tuesday.

louise.roug@latimes.com

Times staff writers Peter Spiegel and Paul Richter in Washington contributed to this report.