Source:
From The Sunday TimesFrom The Sunday Times
September 2, 2007
UK troops poised to quit Basra
Michael Smith and Sarah Baxter, Washington
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The Iraqi army is on course to take control of Basra province by the autumn with October seen as the earliest point at which it would be ready, according to Whitehall officials.
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According to defence sources in Washington, American commanders in Baghdad have accepted that British troops are on their way out of Iraq, prompting further criticism this weekend from US military commentators. Frederick Kagan, of the American Enterprise Institute, said it was “hard to imagine” conditions that would allow a handover next month. “It really highlights the growing divergence between the British and American approach,” he said.
General Jack Keane, a key architect of the US troop “surge” in Iraq, said the handover plans had “much more to do with conditions in the UK” than those in Iraq.
Government attempts to play down the simmering row with the US were hampered by General Sir Mike Jackson, former head of the British Army, who launched a scathing attack yesterday on American handling of postwar Iraq.
Read more:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article2368539.ece