http://talkingpointsmemo.com/(December 10, 2003 -- 08:36 PM EDT // link // print)
Let's put together a calendar for next spring in Iraq.
Under the current plan, the US occupation authorities will hand over sovereignty to an Iraqi government on July 1st 2004.
It seems reasonable to suspect that the month or two before that date (i.e., May and June) would be prime moments for the insurgents to up their attacks in order to throw the new government off balance and kill it (or at least its efficacy) in the cradle. However you want to define it, for all sorts of reasons, late spring next year looks like a window when the insurgents can use demonstrative violence most effectively to achieve their ends.
(snip)
But look at what else is happening at just that time.
From February through May, the Pentagon will cycle out almost all the troops now serving in Iraq -- 130,000 will be pulled out and 118,000 will replace them.
That means that at more or less precisely the time when you can predict there's going to be a maximum effort on the part of the insurgents to destabilize the new government and the process of handover, those insurgents will face US troops who, in almost every case, will have just arrived in the country.
Add to that the fact that April and May marks the onset of the hot season in Iraq, and that a lot of the military's attention at that crucial point will be focused on the logistics of cycling the troops.
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