New demands test troop stamina

With America's all-volunteer military facing its longest sustained combat ever, US commanders are raising the question: How far can these troops be pushed?

Some US troops now in Iraq, including marines fighting in the volatile city of Fallujah, are already on their second tour during this war. And soldiers from the Army's 3rd Infantry Division who fought their way to Baghdad a year ago are scheduled to head back within months.

Finally, there are soldiers like Sgt. Bryce Syverson, a Bradley gunner with the 1st Armored Division, who arrived in Kuwait on his way home at the end of a year-long tour - only to be yanked back to Baghdad last week along with 20,000 other soldiers abruptly ordered to stay on there.

"Hey Mom and Dad, as you know I am back in this [expletive] hole," Sergeant Syverson wrote from Baghdad, as his unit prepared to head south to put down rebellious Shiite militia. "Sounds like there will be some shootouts with the bad guys," he said, adding, "I just hope that we are the good guys."

Facing the deadliest period of fighting in Iraq since the war began, US commanders this week ordered 20,000 seasoned but war-weary US troops from the 1st Armored Division and 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment to remain in that country for three to four months to help put down Sunni and Shiite unrest that has spiraled with the approach of the June 30 transfer of power to Iraqi authorities.

US commanders say US forces are currently adequate to handle unrest in Fallujah and a potential showdown in Najaf against the militia of hard-line Shiite cleric Muqtada al Sadr. "Negotiations [with Sadr] are ongoing [but] they can't go on...forever," said Gen. Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who visited Iraq this week to gauge the military situation. The reinforcements will also be used to secure crucial supply routes, which have come under intensified attack from insurgents in recent days, General Myers said.

The Pentagon's abrupt decision to bolster US forces in Iraq by tens of thousands to 135,000 - rather than drawing down to 110,000 in May as planned - is deepening concerns about how far to stretch America's already overextended all-volunteer military and its readiness to address other global contingencies.

US military planners are already scheduling multiple, year-long Iraq rotations. President Bush said Tuesday that the one-year duration of the occupation so far is "a relatively short period of time." Yet he acknowledged that "it seems like a long time to the loved ones whose troops have been overseas."

The Army and Marine Corps are scrambling to identify thousands of additional forces in the United States and elsewhere who can, if necessary, relieve those extended beyond their planned year-long tours of duty.

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