obamamath

144,000 troops in Iraq when obama took office minus 50,000 remaining = 94,000 troops withdrawn (source)

98,000 troops in Afghanistan now minus 34,000 troops in Afghanistan when obama took office = 64,000 new troops in Afghanistan (source)

94,000 withdrawn from Iraq minus 64,000 added to Afghanistan = 30,000 net troop reduction

To be sure, 30,000 of our men and women back home is a good thing. However, it's a bit of a shell game to trumpet that the combat mission in Iraq is over (which isn't totally accurate - as far as I'm concerned, if people are getting shot at and blown up, it's a combat mission) while ramping up the mission in Afghanistan. 

And for what it's worth, the shooting stopped in Korea 57 years ago, yet we still have 30,000 troops stationed there.

In an instructive WSJ article, Noah Feldman points out that it took 35 years for democracy to take hold in South Korea. To fully complete the mission, U.S. troops could be in Iraq just as long. In other words, the latest Iraq troop withdrawal could very well be viewed as a beginning and not an end (or to borrow from Winston Churchill, the end of the beginning). "Iraq faces a raft of difficulties if it is to become an effective, self-governing nation, and all of them point to the need for a continuing U.S. role in security and beyond."

I hope that 35 years from now Iraq mirrors South Korea - a stable, prosperous democracy. That would be a worthy legacy for the men and women who have sacrificed so much there to date.