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Saturday, January 28, 2006
Iraq is part of 'long war,' U.S. general says
Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the Central Command deputy commander for planning and strategy in Iraq, stepped into a Seattle coffee shop Friday far from the "long war."
Kimmitt was in town for a meeting with Seattle P-I editorial writers while visiting former colleagues at Fort Lewis. Kimmitt served there in 1974 and again in 1982. He met his wife of 23 years in Tacoma and maintains state residency, owning a home here.
The "long war" is the term for the generations-long U.S. geopolitical strategy for countering Islamist extremism around the world.
More than a military effort, Kimmitt said the "long war" aims "to defeat an ideology" as much as the leadership of al-Qaida and its related terrorist networks.
Doing that involves a mix of military and humanitarian approaches that could include the United Nations, he said. It requires building a network to counter terrorism networks, such as the mix of U.S. military and humanitarian assistance now in the Horn of Africa.
While Iraq has top priority, the "long war" sees beyond.
"We don't want to be in Iraq one day longer than necessary, and we don't want to be in Iraq one day shorter than necessary," he said. "We operate in an environment of consent. The day we are seen as occupiers, that culture will not accept us.
"We already have handed over significant chunks of territory to the Iraqis. Those are not simply plans to do so; they are being executed right now. It is not only our plan but our policy that we do not intend to have any permanent bases in Iraq."
He said the Iraq army has changed for the good. "I was there when they crumbled and ran off the battlefield, two years, even a year and a half ago. They don't do that now."
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