The War In Iraq Over By Mid-2009?

The war in Iraq has been advertised by the media as a central issue in the November elections. I certainly don’t disagree. This war is a critical issue that brings to mind a host of issues—human rights, the morality of preemptive war, the American interventionist mentality, and our moral obligations to the Iraqi people now as we try to leave more justly than we entered.

Sen. Barack Obama has criticized the war from the beginning. Despite his most recent "refinements" of that issue, he boasts that his plans to exit Iraq have not changed and he will began to withdraw troops immediately once he takes office. This is certainly sweet talk for voters who are anti-war that disapprove of the Bush Administration’s philosophy on foreign policy and their method of combating the war on terror.

A recent development on the ground in Iraq may cancel out or at least downplay the significance of the Iraq issue in the November elections. Essentially, regardless of who wins the presidential office, it looks like that the war will end either way “by mid-2009.”

From Yahoo! News:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. ground troops in Iraq will be mostly finished with security operations by the middle of 2009, the senior U.S. Army officer in charge of training Iraqi forces said on Wednesday.

"The ground forces will mostly be done by the middle of next year," Army Lt. Gen. James Dubik told the U.S. House of Representatives Armed Services Committee.

That could be between April and August, Dubik said.

Dubik declined to say when all U.S. forces, including naval and air forces, would be finished with Iraqi combat operations. He said that would depend on when the Iraqi government completes certain tasks, such as purchasing its own aircraft.

Dubik said in January that Iraqi forces could take over security in all of the country's 18 provinces by the end of 2008.

Dubik's comments come as officials in Iraq raise the prospect of setting a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. forces as part of negotiations over a new security deal with Washington. U.S. officials have said they oppose setting dates for withdrawal.

(Reporting by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Kristin Roberts)