BAGHDAD -- The top U.S. general and diplomat in Iraq warnedThursday against cutting short the American troop buildup andsuggested they would urge Congress in September to give PresidentBush's strategy more time.
Ambassador Ryan Crocker and Gen. David Petraeus, in separateinterviews at their offices in the U.S. Embassy on the banks of theTigris, were careful not to define a time frame for continuing thecounterinsurgency strategy and the higher U.S. troop levels, whichbegan six months ago.
Still, Petraeus' comments signaled that he would like to see asubstantial U.S. combat force remain on its current course well into2008 and perhaps beyond. He said a drawdown from today's level of160,000 U.S. troops is coming but he would not say when.
Petraeus said he and his top deputy, Lt. Gen. Ray Odierno, areworking on how to carry out a reduction in the extra troops Bushordered to Baghdad and to Anbar province. He said the drawdown wouldbe done "over time, without undermining what we've fought toachieve."
"There is a lot more that we certainly will try to do," Petraeussaid.
With the American public's patience wearing thin, many inCongress are pressing for a troop reduction soon. Bush has resisted,saying he is waiting to receive the advice of Petraeus and Crockerin September.
Pressed repeatedly on when he thought troop levels could bereduced and other U.S. involvement scaled back, Crocker said: "It'sgoing to take longer than September."
He said he saw his mission as ensuring "we're all looking atreality. I don't think any service is done either in Iraq or theU.S. by saying, again, 'It's going to be OK by November.' This ishard. There is tremendous damage that's been done physically,politically, socially, and it's going to take time to repair."
U.S. military officers have said in recent interviews that whiletroop levels should be determined as conditions evolve, they seelittle reason to remove the full 30,000 U.S. troop buildup beforenext summer.
Petraeus said he would make his case in September, when he andCrocker are due to report to Congress on military and politicalprogress and on their recommendations for the future.
He said the troop buildup has clearly established "tacticalmomentum," meaning its more aggressive efforts to secure volatileneighborhoods in Baghdad and areas around the capital aresucceeding.
"The surge enables us to turn the tide just a bit in key places,"the four-star general said.
Asked what more the U.S. military needs to accomplish to put Iraqon a steadier track, Petraeus ticked of a list that includedfurthering the training and equipping of Iraqi security forces.
, which are intended to gradually take over for U.S. forces,beginning in areas where security and political conditions allow.
"We want to make much more progress against al-Qaida. We wouldlike to build on the early momentum from local groups rejecting al-Qaida and militias," Petraeus said. We want to certainly not justsit on the violence in Baghdad neighborhoods and stabilize it but tocreate a way ahead that can be sustained by the Iraqis over time. Wewant to, where possible, frankly, to continue the process of handingoff to Iraqis."
Crocker spoke more directly of his conviction that the currentstrategy should be maintained -- and about his concern that if theUnited States were to withdraw now Iraq would be plunged into ahumanitarian disaster.
"It is not as though we can simply decide that we do not want tobe involved anymore and the movie comes to an end," he said. "Themovie will keep on rolling in Iraq and in the region whether we'rehere or not.
"I, for one, as someone who has spent decades in the Middle East,am deeply concerned about what could happen if we decide based onreasons other than conditions on the ground in Iraq that we simplydon't want to be involved anymore."
He said the consequence could be inroads by the al-Qaidaterrorist network, a consolidation of Iranian influence in Iraq,intervention by Turkey and other neighboring states, and a "massivehuman catastrophe."
Sprinkled throughout his remarks were references to a need forpatience in seeing Iraq through its current crisis.
"There are no easy, quick, magic answers at this stage," he said.
Petraeus, who was installed as the top U.S. commander here inFebruary as the troop buildup got under way, underscored his beliefthat the extra troops have produced the intended benefit of reducingsectarian murders, encouraging more Iraqis to help U.S. forces andsqueezing extremist groups.
"Once you get the locals recognizing that you are going to bethere a while, they then tell you" where insurgent forces arehiding, where they have placed roadside bombs and where they storeweapons, he said.
The problem, at this stage, is that these developments have notled the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to push throughkey legislative measures and to move toward political reconciliationbetween the majority Shiites, the Kurds and the Sunnis who lostpower when Saddam Hussein was toppled.
Petraeus said he believed the Sunnis are beginning to see theirfuture in a different, more positive light.
They have "gotten a little bit past the point where they were thelast few years, which was one of feeling disrespected, dispossessed,disappointed, disgusted, distressed, you name it, at their loss ofpower," he said.
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Associated Press Writer Steven R. Hurst contributed to thisstory.
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