2011 அளவில் முழுமையாக அமெரிக்க படையினர் ஈராக்கை விட்டு வெளியேறிவிடுவார்களாம்.

அமெரிக்க சனாதிபதி பராக ஒபாமா கூறுகிறார் அடுத்த வருடம் ஆவணியில் தொடங்கி 2011 அளவில் முழுமையாக அமெரிக்க படையினர் ஈராக்கை விட்டு வெளியேறிவிடுவார்களாம்.

US troops to leave Iraq by end 2011: officials

WASHINGTON (AFP) - All US combat troops will leave Iraq by August next year and a full withdrawal will be completed by the end of 2011 under a strategy to be laid out Friday by President Barack Obama, top officials said.

Obama, an early opponent of the US-led 2003 invasion, will fulfill his campaign promise to withdraw US troops slightly behind schedule.

There are currently about 142,000 US troops in Iraq but the conflict -- in which more than 4,250 US troops have died -- has deeply divided the US public and badly hit the United States' international standing.

Obama will set out the withdrawal deadlines in a speech at Camp Lejeune, a major US Marine base in North Carolina. He will announce that "our combat mission will end on August 31, 2010," a senior US official told reporters, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"At that point, the US forces remaining in Iraq will undertake a new mission, a more limited mission, that will be focused on three specific areas," the official said.

This would be to "train, equip, and advise the Iraqi security forces," to protect US civilian personnel in Iraq, and to conduct "targeted counter-terrorism operations on its own and in conjunction with the Iraqi forces," the official said.

The US force will be between 35,000 and 50,000 soldiers, the official said, while stressing that this was "an estimate at this point because we're obviously several months out."

The goal is for "a complete drawdown of US forces in Iraq ... to zero by December 31, 2011," in compliance with the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) that President George W. Bush signed with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki in 2008.

A second senior US official said US military commander in Iraq, General Ray Odierno, believed it was "very important to have adequate forces to get through a number of key events in 2009," especially mid-year regional elections and national elections scheduled for December.

The withdrawal will begin "relatively quickly", the first official said, but the pace "will be left in the hands of the commanders in Iraq," the second official added.

Obama is clear that the military accord with Iraq does not envision military bases like the United States has in South Korea, the first official said.

"We believe that this is the plan that will advance our interests in Iraq, in the region, (and) will ensure that we can responsibly bring our troops home and increase our flexibility as it relates to other challenges," the official said.

The officials made it clear that less troops in Iraq would mean more troops to fight the Taliban in Afghanistan, which Obama has said is his priority.

The withdrawal will take 19 months, slightly longer than the 16 months which he had promised while running for president in 2008.

Few Americans are likely to complain about the extra three months, experts said. With the US economy in a tailspin, Iraq is no longer a top concern.

A January poll showed that 61 percent of Americans believed that Iraq war, which has cost hundreds of billions of dollars on top of the human toll for the United States and Iraq, was simply not worth it.

Polls also show support for Obama's move to send more US troops to Afghanistan.

Obama held a private White House meeting late Thursday with congressional leaders and revealed the plans, US media reported.

There was strong Republican support, especially from Senator John McCain -- Obama's rival in the 2008 election -- who reportedly described it as thoughtful and well prepared.

A leading Republican lawmaker said Obama had assured him that he had a "Plan B" in place and would "revisit" the arrangement if security deteriorates in Iraq.

"Iraq faces significant challenges in 2009," John McHugh, the top Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, said in a statement.

"Our commanders must have the flexibility they need in order to respond to these challenges, and President Obama assured me that there is a 'Plan B,'" he said.

However some prominent Democrats, including House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, have criticized the plan for a "residual force" of soldiers.

"I don't know what the justification is for ... the 50,000 troops in Iraq," Pelosi said in an interview on MSNBC. "I would think a third of that, maybe ... 15,000 or 20,000," would be sufficient, she said.

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