The debris of an occupation
Well, it’s a start — U.S. troops may not be flowing steadily out of Iraq yet, but a lot of our stuff is. From the New York Times on Friday:
There is no more visible sign that America is putting the Iraq war behind it than the colossal operation to get its stuff out: 20,000 soldiers, nearly a sixth of the force here, assigned to a logistical effort aimed at dismantling some 300 bases and shipping out 1.5 million pieces of equipment, from tanks to coffee makers.
It is the largest movement of soldiers and matériel in more than four decades, the military said.
. . . just as the buildup in the Kuwaiti desert before the 2003 invasion made it plain that the United States was almost certain to go to war, the preparations for withdrawal just as clearly point to the end of the American military role here. Reversing the process, even if Iraq’s relative stability deteriorates into violence, becomes harder every day.
A lot of what the U.S. spent our money to build will be left behind:
Congress has limited the total value of equipment — like computers and furniture — that the military can leave to the Iraqis to roughly $15 million per base, but that amount does not include items considered part of the infrastructure, like buildings, sewerage and power facilities.
. . . Commanders say it is often simply more economical to turn over more equipment to the Iraqis because the cost of moving it is prohibitive. Last month, the military announced the end of its detention operations at Camp Bucca on the Kuwaiti border and said that $50 million worth of infrastructure and equipment would be given to the Iraqis.
But the sad truth is that not all of the items are coming home:
The military has largely identified which materials are not essential anymore and has begun to move them out of the country, in some cases to Afghanistan. For instance, lumber, ammunition and barriers used to defend against car bombs are all desperately needed in Afghanistan, and as bases are taken apart here, those are among the items sent to the fight there, commanders said.
Just goes to show that a Nobel Peace Prize winner’s work is never done, I guess. . . .
(Cross-posted at Firedoglake.)
October 12th, 2009 at 9:21 am
Nothing new – before the locals were making off with all the equipment, wires and pipes from our infrastructure projects, this will just be final cleanup project.
October 13th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Its interesting to see our stuff being taken out. I remember reading how we left behind a lot of equipment in Vietnam. I guess the military is not interested in a repeat of that.