MR. BFRY BREAKS DOWN YOUR WORLD

Even is it's only 2,000 troops being added, that's still 2,000 more troops that will help a woefully underequipped and underdeployed army.

From the NYTIMES

WASHINGTON, Aug. 23 - Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld announced plans on Tuesday to send up to 2,000 more American soldiers to Iraq to raise troop levels before a referendum on the Iraqi constitution in October.

Pentagon officials said later that the troops, two battalions of the 82nd Airborne Division, were requested by senior commanders in Iraq who were concerned that insurgents might step up attacks to disrupt the referendum and national elections in December, the officials said.

The extra soldiers will be part of a temporary increase in American troop strength for the referendum, to about 160,000 from about 138,000 now. The overall increase will be accomplished mostly by delaying the departure of some units already there and arranging an earlier arrival for units that are due to go, the officials said.

The additional troops from the 82nd Airborne, a light infantry unit, will probably be used at checkpoints, freeing mechanized units to do more patrolling in the weeks before the voting, a Pentagon official said.

Mr. Rumsfeld acknowledged that a surge in insurgent attacks was likely this fall as the referendum neared. "Regrettably, completing the constitution is not likely to end all the violence in Iraq or solve all of the country's problems," he said.

A senior Army official said the increase in troops had been requested by the two top American commanders in the region, Gen. John P. Abizaid and Gen. George W. Casey Jr. The two additional battalions would be deployed to Mosul and Baghdad and remain in Iraq for no more than 120 days, according to two senior Army officials. The Army and Pentagon officials did not want to be identified because deployment orders have not been made public.

The Pentagon increased American troop levels to around the same level before elections in Iraq last January. Despite a spike in violence before the election, there was minimal violence on the day of the balloting. American officials hope to see a repetition of that relative calm in October and in December, when more elections to choose a new National Assembly will be held.

American military officials are counting on Iraqi security forces to do more to provide security at polling places and checkpoints than they did in January, freeing American units to handle security on the outskirts of cities and in especially volatile areas, like the Sunni Triangle mostly west and north of Baghdad.