To hear the White House tell it, the president’s latest escalation plan includes sending 21,500 additional U.S. troops into Iraq. For many military and policy experts, that’s far too many, and the number should be going down, not up.
In an added twist, however, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that the administration has vastly underestimated the actual number of extra troops that will be deployed.
The administration’s estimate of approximately 21,000 extra troops only counts combat units, according to the analysis, and because combat units require support forces, the actual number of additional troops who will be in Iraq will likely exceed 35,000.
From the analysis (you can read it here):
To reflect some of the uncertainty about the number of support troops, CBO developed its estimates on the basis of two alternative assumptions. In one scenario, CBO assumed that additional support troops would be deployed in the same proportion to combat troops that currently exists in Iraq. That approach would require about 28,000 support troops in addition to the 20,000 combat troops — a total of 48,000. CBO also presents an alternative scenario that would include a smaller number of support personnel — about 3,000 per combat brigade — totaling about 15,000 support personnel and bringing the total additional forces to about 35,000. [emphasis added]
Well, that’s quite a difference, isn’t it?
First, there are the practical and logistical concerns.
Boosting U.S. troop levels in Iraq by 21,500 would create major logistical hurdles for the Army and Marine Corps, which are short thousands of vehicles, armor kits and other equipment needed to supply the extra forces, U.S. officials said.
The increase would also further degrade the readiness of U.S.-based ground forces, hampering their ability to respond quickly, fully trained and well equipped in the case of other military contingencies around the world and increasing the risk of U.S. casualties, according to Army and Marine Corps leaders.
With thousands of additional troops added to the deployment mix, the burdens become that much more significant.
Second, there are the financial concerns.
The analysis, which estimated the cost of the president’s plan “from $9 billion to $13 billion for a four-month deployment and from $20 billion to $27 billion for a 12-month deployment,” was sent to House Committee on the Budget Chairman John Spratt (D-SC) today.
And on a less significant note, there may even be a political angle. There are plenty of supporters of the war who have grumbled about the 21,500-soldier “surge” not being big enough. To an extent, they’ve even used the size of the escalation to distance themselves from the revised policy. Now we’re learning that the escalation is significantly larger than advertised. Will McCain & Co., who wanted a bigger deployment, now have to revise their criticisms to say 48,000 troops is still too small?
Not incidentally, there’s also the public, a large majority of which disapproves of sending 21,500 additional troops. If the CBO is right and the administration has underestimated the actual deployment, the public’s displeasure is likely to get far more intense.