The US is Renaming its Occupation, not Leaving Iraq

An article published by Guardian, the British website, on Wednesday August 4 writes that the US is not withdrawing from Iraq, but ‘rebranding the occupation'

The US president Barack Obama on Tuesday confirmed the plan for US troops' drawdown from Iraq by 31 August.

The US president promised that the operations in Iraq would come to an end based on the schedule.

Some 15,000 of 65,000 US soldiers will be pulled out of Iraq and the rest, about 50,000 US troops, are to remain advising Iraqi troops and protecting US interests there, reports say.

The truth is, the US is not leaving Iraq at all but it is just giving a new name to the occupation, the article writes.

The article compares the confirmation of the troops' withdrawal from Iraq with a move by the former US President, George Bush on the war on terror that was retitled "overseas contingency operations".

The US "combat operations" will be renamed from next month as "stability operations", the article further writes.

The reports on the Iraq exit comes as last week the US Defence Secretary, Robert Gates in an interview with ABC had told the US troops will not leave Afghanistan and the drawdown on 2011 will be in small numbers based on the conditions on the ground.