"'There will be a U.S. military presence. The Office of Security Cooperation (OSC), operating under the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, will have several hundred military personnel, and at least an equal number or more U.S. contractors, who will work with Iraqi security forces. Ongoing negotiations with Iraq about OSC activities will determine exact staffing numbers." Pincus
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The "300." that is what they are calling the several hundred active duty military people who will be left in Iraq. There will be the dozen or so in the Defense Attache Office of the embassy, the US Marine security guard for the embassy, just a handfull of marines. The largest number wil be in the security assistance office (whatever they call it). This office will be subordinate to the theater (COCOM) commnder at USCENTCOM. They will train Iraqis and will be altogether dependent on the Iraqis for their security. "Stranger passing by..." The civilians in the mission will be in the same position.
This is remarkably like the situation we left behind in VN in the spring of 1973. The terms of the armistice in VN in '72 allowed the US to keep similar numbers in country attached to the embassy. If memory serves there were about 2,000. They continued training and advising the South Vietnamese forces. The North Vietnamese Army sat out in the woods hear the Cambodian and Laotian borders. This situation persisted for about two years until the US Congress forbade any further aid for the South Vietnamese, ever. The North Vietnamese then attacked and captured all the major towns within a few weeks.
The Pacific Ocean was nearby in 1975. A Non-Combatant Evacuation operation was possible. As I have said before it is a long way to the sea from central Iraq.
Good luck to them all. pl
