Lara Jakes and Rebecca Santana: US Abandoning Plans to Keep Troops in Iraq

The US is abandoning plans to keep US troops in Iraq past a year-end withdrawal deadline, The Associated Press has learned. The decision to pull out fully by January will effectively end more than eight years of US involvement in the Iraq war, despite ongoing concerns about its security forces and the potential for instability. The decision ends months hand-wringing by US officials over whether to stick to a December 31 withdrawal deadline that was set in 2008, or negotiate a new security agreement to ensure that gains made, and more than 4,000 American military lives lost since March 2003 do not go to waste. In recent months, Washington has been discussing with Iraqi leaders the possibility of several thousand American troops remaining to continue training Iraqi security forces. A Pentagon spokesman said Saturday that no final decision has been reached about the US training relationship with the Iraqi government, but a senior Obama administration official in Washington confirmed the departure, and said the withdrawal could allow future, but limited US military training missions in Iraq, if requested. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.