As British prepare to withdraw, commander studies other withdrawals, with Vietnam "obvious parallel"

NYT: British Pullback in Iraq Presages Hurdles for U.S.
By STEPHEN FARRELL
Published: July 29, 2007

BASRA, Iraq — As American troop levels are peaking in Baghdad, British force levels are heading in the opposite direction as the troops prepare to withdraw completely from the city center of Basra, 300 miles to the south.

The British intend to pull back to an airport headquarters miles out of town, a symbolic move widely taken by Iraqis as the beginning of the end of the British military presence in southern Iraq.

The scaling down by America’s largest coalition partner foreshadows many of the political and military challenges certain to face American commanders when their troops begin withdrawing.

Skepticism is widespread in Basra, as in Baghdad, about whether Iraqi forces are ready to take over. The British and the Americans will have to assuage the fears of Iraqis that they are being abandoned to gunmen and religious extremists. And each is likely to face intensified attacks from propaganda-conscious enemies trying to claim credit for driving out the Westerners.

As the British prepare for the withdrawal from the city center — and the wider transition of handing over Basra Province to Iraqi security forces during the coming months — Brig. James Bashall, commander of the First Mechanized Brigade, concedes that his men will almost certainly “get a lot of indirect fire as we go backward.”

It is no coincidence that he is reading up on Britain’s withdrawal from its former crown colony Aden in what is now Yemen, and lessons from other theaters, with the American experience in Vietnam as the “obvious parallel.”...

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/29/world/middleeast/29basra.html?hp=&pagewanted=all