Home pagePress CenterIn the Media Anthony Cordesman, the CSIS Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, was quoted by the National Journal, "A Dime's Worth of Difference?"
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Anthony Cordesman, the CSIS Arleigh A. Burke Chair in Strategy, was quoted by the National Journal, "A Dime's Worth of Difference?"
In practice, accomplishing the candidates' more limited goals in Iraq would still mean leaving anywhere from 10,000 to 75,000 troops in Iraq, or more. It currently takes more than 100,000 military personnel, and an equal number of contractors, to fulfill those same three missions in Iraq, according to a rough count by Anthony Cordesman, the Arleigh A. Burke Chair in strategy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Both candidates have indicated they would like to reduce America's footprint in the country and use air and special operations teams to carry out strikes on Al Qaeda in Iraq, but Cordesman says that that notion is virtually meaningless until the Iraqi army and security forces are ready to stand on their own. "We'd kill some cadres but have little or no overall impact, and we'd lose almost all of our [human intelligence] once we withdrew," he said.
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