Five years on, Britain seeks low-key exit from Iraq

By Luke Baker

LONDON (Reuters) - Five years after declaring it stood shoulder-to-shoulder with the United States in sending troops to invade Iraq, Britain is quietly easing its way out.

Some 150,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq, but just 4,100 Britons -- a tenth of the British invasion force -- are left, hunkered down in one base. Even those could be withdrawn by the end of this year, British officials have said.

When they invaded on March 20, 2003, Britain's 40,000 troops were set the task of securing southern Iraq and especially Basra, a city of more than two million people and the strategic hub for Iraq's multi-billion-dollar oil exports.

Britain now has no soldiers in Basra following their withdrawal to a heavily fortified base at Basra airport, several miles outside the city, and southern Iraq remains the scene of frequent violent clashes between rival Iraqi factions.

The hope five years ago that Basra could become a hive of business and trade, and southern Iraq a secure bastion for the country's Shi'ite Muslim majority, has all but disappeared.

For experts on the conflict, Britain's quiet departure underlines just how rapidly aspirations can die. It is in marked contrast to Washington's continued high-level commitment to the rest of Iraq, even though the Democrats could pull out troops if their candidate wins November's U.S. presidential election.

"Just as the British cut and run, give up the ghost and go home, the United States is expanding its commitment to try to stabilize Iraq. That's the dichotomy in a nutshell," said Toby Dodge, an Iraq expert at Queen Mary college, part of the University of London.

UNPOPULAR WAR

Since taking over from Tony Blair last June, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has sought to draw a line under a war that is unpopular with the British public. Blair's popularity sank when large numbers of Britons took part in protests to oppose the conflict and his staunch backing of President George W. Bush.

"Gordon Brown has drawn down from Basra in an attempt to secure his re-election," Dodge said.

"Basra is now in a horrible mess and Britain has not carried out the promises made by Blair on the eve of the invasion. Frankly, I think it was a shoddy decision to pull out of Basra."

Britain's Ministry of Defence says the bulk of the work that troops set out to do has been achieved, although 175 Britons have been killed and several thousand wounded.

A common refrain from military commanders is that Britain's soldiers have done what they could in difficult circumstances.

As Iraq's security forces have grown in strength, Britain has handed responsibility over to them, transferring authority in all four of Iraq's southern provinces, completing one of the key commitments it had set itself. Brown has promised that Britain will invest in Basra for years to come.

"Things are getting better," Defence Secretary Des Browne said last October as Britain handed over Basra province.