3 Generals speak out for withdrawal

Their positions are not new but the three made some good points when they said that a withdrawal was the best thing to do in Iraq.

Scales testified along with two other retired Army generals, Gen. Barry McCaffrey and Lt. Gen. William Odom, who also agreed a withdrawal of U.S. combat troops early in the next president’s administration is inevitable.

“We face a deteriorating political situation with an over-extended Army,” said Odom, who served as director of the National Security Agency in the Reagan administration.

“The only sensible strategy is to withdraw rapidly but in good order,” Odom said. “Only that step can break the paralysis now gripping U.S. strategy in the region.”

McCaffrey, a former chief of U.S. Southern Command and commander of the 24th Infantry Division in the 1991 Gulf War, predicted a withdrawal of U.S. forces within three years or less because there is “no U.S. political will to continue” and because allies “have abandoned us.”

“It is over,” McCaffrey said.