Murtha tells CNN: 'Surge has failed,' prepare to redeploy
Congressman John Murtha (D-PA) believes that President Bush's "surge" or escalation of US troops into Iraq "has failed," and that redeployment would not necessarily cause the humanitarian crisis that the White House has warned may happen and there might even be more stability.
"I think the surge has failed," Murtha told CNN's John Roberts on American Morning. "I think there was no possibility that it was going to work. I think the British had 130,000 people there 50 years ago, and -- well, it was 80 years ago, and they had only 2.5 million people in Iraq."
Murtha doesn't believe conditions would get worse following a withdrawal, despite a recent op-ed written by former Secretary of State James Baker, who was co-chairman of the Iraq Study Group, which warned, "A premature American departure from Iraq, we unanimously concluded, would almost certainly produce greater sectarian violence and further deterioration of conditions in Iraq and possibly other countries."
"I have a high regard for James Baker, but that's what the White House has been saying," Murtha said. "Just because they say it, doesn't make it true. We already have sectarian violence. We already have civil war and our troops are caught in between."
Murtha added that the "place wouldn't fall apart" and that "the Shias would understand that they have to deal with the Sunnis."
"There's going to be redeployment," Murtha insisted. "It's just a matter of when."
The following video is from CNN's American Morning.
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