Will A Surge of 20,000 Be Enough?

from the LA Times.com

[Army Lt. Gen. David] Petraeus developed the Army's counter-insurgency warfare manual, which calls for one police officer or military member for every 50 residents. In Baghdad alone, that would translate to a security force of 120,000.

But by Petraeus' own count, a security force of only 85,000 will be present in the capital even after an additional 21,500 U.S. troops are in Iraq to augment the roughly 140,000 already there.

So, according to the man to be in charge, they will be short 35,000 troops to "stabilize" Baghdad.

One might argue that if you're not going to or able to send the right number of troops, we should just withdraw instead.