Joint chiefs chairman warns on speedy Iraq exit

By Bryan Bender, Globe Staff

WASHINGTON -- President-elect Barack Obama's signature campaign promise to withdraw US troops from Iraq in 16 months appears to be on a collision course with the nation's top military brass if comments today from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff are any indication.

In his first press conference since the election, Admiral Mike Mullen this afternoon said he believes the soonest all US forces could be safely withdrawn from Iraq is "two to three years."

"We have 150,000 troops in Iraq right now," the nation's top military officer told reporters at the Pentagon. "We have lots of bases. We have an awful lot of equipment that's there. And so we would have to look at all of that [and] the security conditions that are there. And clearly we'd want to be able to do it safely."

Mullen, who has completed the first year of a two-year term, has long supported drawing down US troops only as security improvements warrant and has repeatedly warned against setting a date certain to end the US military commitment.

Today's comments, however, indicate that he is preparing to caution the incoming president -- with whom aides say he has already held at least one conversation -- against a speedy withdrawal.

"I certainly understand there are other options," Mullen said. "And it's something that we look at all the time. But at the same time....from the military's perspective, I think it's best to be conditions-based."

On the campaign trail Obama said he would consult his top military advisers before ordering a withdrawal from Iraq, but also made withdrawing most US combat troops within 16 months of taking office a centerpiece of his presidential bid. Any backsliding on his pledge would likely provoke an outcry from anti-war Democrats -- one of his key political constituencies.

But Obama's own countrymen -- in or out of uniform -- may not prove to be the biggest roadblock to realizing his plan to end the war in Iraq and divert more military resources to Afghanistan.

A Status of Forces Agreement between the United States and Iraq recently approved by the Bush administration and the Iraqi cabinet calls for the removal of US troops by the end of 2011. Once approved by the Iraqi Parliament, which began debate on the measure today, it cannot be changed by either side for at least a year, according to Article 31 of the draft agreement.

Democratic lawmakers including Representative William Delahunt of Quincy fear the clause "may effectively tie the hands of the next administration." Delahunt plans to convene a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee to review the accord on Wednesday.