Officials worry pullout will create logistics crunch

Washington: The US military withdrawal from Iraq will create a shortage of helicopters and logistics support that high-level officials worry will hamper the elite US troops who stay behind to train Iraqi forces and to combat terrorist networks, according to experts studying the problem.

The shortage is part of an overall logistics crunch that the Pentagon is grappling with as it shifts forces from Iraq to Afghanistan, where the rugged terrain and lack of infrastructure require more helicopter transport, engineers and a slew of other support capabilities.

As the US military pulls out the bulk of its 142,000 troops from Iraq by August 2010, troops such as Army Green Berets, who are specially trained to partner with foreign forces, are expected to remain in significant numbers.

Yet those troops currently are dependent upon the basing, aviation, communications and other logistical backing of conventional US Army brigades that are slated to leave the country.

Senior Special Operations officials "are really worried about the conventional Army pulling out of Iraq and leaving us holding the bag unable to support ourselves", said Roger Carstens, who studied the problem as a nonresident fellow for the Centre for a New American Security and testified on the issue last week before a House panel.

The leadership of the US Special Operations Command in Tampa, Florida, is particularly concerned about the Army's difficulty in splitting off from its brigades vital capabilities including intelligence, communications and helicopters that are needed by the Special Operations troops, Carstens said.

"A lot of people do not understand that SOF (Special Operations forces) are really unable to support themselves," said Carstens, who is currently working at Joint Forces Command in Norfolk, Virginia.

In the longer term, the Pentagon should consider creating at least two additional helicopter battalions dedicated to Special Operations forces, according to Robert Martinage, a senior fellow at the Centre for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment, who also testified last week before the terrorism subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, about two-thirds of Special Operations ground units do not have their own aviation and rely on regular Army units to provide it, Martinage said. As a result, he said that "in Afghanistan, nearly 50 per cent of the lift requests" to support the Special Operations task force there "are routinely unmet", he said.

The shortage of aviation comes as Green Berets and other Special Operations forces are experiencing their heaviest deployments in history as they carry out critical roles of partnering with local security forces and conducting high-level raids in Iraq and Afghanistan.