The Iraqis (via Real Clear Politics) understand this:
Iraqi Defense Ministry analyst Mohammed Askari said Iraqi forces — if provided equipment such as helicopters, tanks and artillery — could protect the country from internal threats within six months. But he added: "Maybe we need American troops for the next few years to protect us from external invasions, because there are various countries with ill intentions against Iraq."
The Iraqis have an immediate threat of an insurgency to fight so they are naturally focused internally. Defeating invasion by enemy conventional forces rightly takes a back seat as long as we fulfill that external defense role for the Iraqis.
Given the squawking by the anti-war side and the failure of the sunshine patriots to maintain support for the war for longer than the flower-throwing phase, the Iraqis must know we will need them to stand on their own at some finite time in the near future without a formal timetable to get out.
Our declining role in fighting will likely be relatively dramatic when the time comes to pull back and let the Iraqis take the lead. But our presence in Iraq must be reduced far more slowly. Reducing our mission and casualties, fortunatley, will reduce the domestic pressure to leave long before we really do start to leave when the Iraqis can stand mostly on their own.
