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Editorial: An overwhelming need

Strip away the political fighting about how long or whether the U.S. should continue fighting the war in Iraq, and one is left with this disturbing fact: After the upcoming rotation of brigade combat teams into Iraq and Afghanistan — 10 deploying and 10 coming home from summer through fall — the Army will have only four BCTs left stateside trained and ready for deployment. By Army standards, there should be at least 12, or one-third of the fighting force.

Even after two more BCTs stand up over the next year, this is the bottom line: The Army cannot significantly increase the number of combat troops in Iraq or Afghanistan — or meet the call for forces anyplace else — without either ordering weary troops back to combat early, extending the deployments of those currently in the war zones, or both.

The Army is too small.

It doesn’t matter whether Iraq ever gets its military in shape or whether Congress and the administration ever agree on benchmarks for progress. The United States has downsized its Army to the point where it cannot sustain a force of 160,000 or more deployed troops for more than a couple of years without breaking the force. And that’s not a viable long-term strategy for a world superpower.

Calling on the National Guard as a relief valve has staved off this problem, but the fact is that force, too, has been pushed to its limits and beyond, so much so that the Guard’s ability to respond quickly and effectively to emergencies at home has also been compromised.

The problem is so bad, leaders in Iraq must do without the numbers they need to defeat the enemy.

On May 11, one month to the day after standard Army combat tours would be extended from 12 to 15 months, Army Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon revealed that he did not have sufficient forces for the mission in Diyala province, north of Baghdad. The “surge” in the Iraqi capital had left him shorthanded.

The Army is desperately trying to add troops, and Chief of Staff Gen. George Casey has announced his intention to accelerate that growth plan by two years, with an eye toward a force of 547,400 troops by 2010.

But even that won’t provide the combat troops needed to meet the demand in a place like Iraq.

In fact, 547,000 soldiers may not be enough.