US Sending more troops to the Gulf

US to send more troops to Gulf - BBC

The Pentagon is expected to send up to 3,300 soldiers to Kuwait in the New Year as Washington considers a policy shift in Iraq, officials say.
If confirmed, the order would be the first to the region signed by Defence Secretary Robert Gates, who has just been on a fact-finding mission to Iraq.

A recent report commissioned by the White House urged a temporary troop build-up to quell increasing violence.

President Bush last week conceded that the US was not winning in Iraq.

But it is still unclear which recommendations he intends to adopt from a report by the Iraq Survey Group, which issued recommendations on the way forward earlier this month.

Among dozens of suggestions, it said dialogue with Iran and Syria - which has been rejected - but also a short-term troop reinforcement to combat the violence and improve the training of Iraqi troops.

In recent weeks, attacks on US and Iraqi troops, as well as civilians, have reached their highest level since power was handed over to an interim Iraqi government in June 2004.

Mr Gates succeeded Donald Rumsfeld - who had been blamed for setbacks in tackling the Iraqi insurgency - as defence secretary earlier this month.

There are around 140,000 troops currently posted in Iraq, with a reserve force kept in neighbouring Kuwait for speedy deployment.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/6211493.stm

Published: 2006/12/27 08:01:25 GMT