Officer sees long stay for Marines

CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. – The new commanding general of the combat force here said Wednesday that U.S. forces were winning the fight against insurgents in Iraq’s al-Anbar province but warned that it might be several years before the Marines would be able to leave the region.

Lt. Gen. Samuel Helland, newly named commanding general of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force and Marine Force Central Command, said his recent trips to the once volatile cities in the province west of Baghdad convinced him that the insurgency was on the run.

“We’re defeating the enemy,” Helland told reporters. “We’re suffocating them; they’re moving out of the area.”

He credited support from tribal sheiks, improvements in Iraqi police and army forces, and aggressiveness among front-line Marines.

Helland said progress was apparent in the cities of Ramadi, Hit, Haditha and Fallujah – where Marines and soldiers once fought gunbattles nearly every day with insurgents. Stores and schools are reopening, children are playing soccer in the streets and buses are running, Helland said.

Still, Helland indicated that the public should not expect a quick pullout of Marines from al-Anbar, the sprawling province that once was home to the strongest Sunni Arab insurgency. Although he declined to fix a specific date, he repeated a maxim often used by military planners, “It can take a decade to win a counterinsurgency.”

The Marines have been in al-Anbar since early 2004.

In coming weeks, Marines from the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force will deploy to al-Anbar to relieve Marines from the Camp Lejeune, N.C.-based 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force.