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WASHINGTON, D.C. - When Operation Iraqi Freedom ends and Operation New Dawn launches Sept. 1, don't look for a lot of fanfare as the mission officially moves from combat to stability operations, the top U.S. Forces Iraq spokesman told American Forces Press Service Aug. 25.

Except for a ceremony in which Army Gen. Raymond T. Odierno will pass command of U.S. forces in Iraq to Army Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III, there will be no official observances of other transitions that already are well under way, Army Maj. Gen. Stephen Lanza said by phone from Baghdad.

"I think it's not going to look much different on Sept. 2," he said. "To be perfectly honest with you, we've been in stability operations for many months now," essentially since U.S. combat troops left Iraqi cities last June.

U.S. forces haven't conducted unilateral operations in Iraq since May 2009, Lanza said. "Everything has been done by, with and through the Iraqi forces," he added.

Meanwhile, the troop drawdown has proceeded smoothly and ahead of schedule. The last full brigade of U.S. combat troops left Iraq last week, and U.S. troop strength dipped below 50,000 yesterday, meeting President Barack Obama's directive a week early.

These developments have set the stage for Operation New Dawn, a mission Lanza said is particularly significant because it coincides with a changeover from a military to a civilian lead in Iraq. This includes the transition from the U.S.-Iraq status of forces agreement that governs U.S. troops in Iraq to implementation of the strategic framework agreement by the U.S. embassy.

The strategic framework agreement is broader in scope, Lanza explained, establishing the foundation for a long-term strategic partnership between the United States and Iraq, long after the last U.S. troops leave in December 2011.

As these transitions unfold, U.S. forces will conduct three major missions during Operation New Dawn, he said.

They'll continue to partner with Iraqi special operations forces in counterinsurgency operations and to advise and assist Iraqi security forces. By embedding with their Iraqi counterparts down to the battalion level, six U.S. advise-and-assist teams have made big strides in quickly building capacity as well as capability, he said.

"More importantly, it has helped us build relationships with these forces to continue to train them," Lanza said. "So that is something we will continue to do until our mission ends in December 2011."

Meanwhile, U.S. troops also will continue to support State Department-run provincial reconstruction teams working to build civil capacity and civil institutions.

The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad has been working hard to bring the parties together to break a near-standstill in forming Iraq's national government. But Lanza said he doesn't expect any major developments until after Ramadan in the latter part of September at the earliest.

He emphasized that Iraq's provincial governors and councils are functioning, with the provincial reconstruction teams and the U.S. Agency for International Development working with provincial leaders to help them build capability and develop their institutions. But much of their success, he acknowledged, will depend on what happens at the federal government level.

"I would suggest, both from a security perspective and also from a security capacity perspective, that the quicker the government gets seated, obviously, the better that is," Lanza said. "We want to see the Iraqis succeed. And we believe that if they get this government moving, they will have that opportunity."

Lanza recognized the potential Operation New Dawn will open up for Iraq.

"Iraq has an opportunity here to do something very unique in this region," he said. "We have sacrificed a lot here, the Iraqis have sacrificed a lot here, and there is a potential right now, an opportunity right now, for Iraq to be a safe, sovereign and self-reliant country."

Once achieving that state, Iraq could serve an effective role in enhancing security and economic growth and stability throughout the region, he said.

"The jury is still out on how long that is going to take to occur," Lanza said. "But I would just say that the sacrifices that have been made have given the Iraqis an opportunity to move forward here. And we are seeing that return on investment."

WASHINGTON - An infected flash drive inserted into a Defense Department computer in 2008 caused "a significant compromise" of the department's classified computer networks and was a "wake-up call" for Pentagon officials to expedite cyber defense measures, the deputy secretary of defense revealed in a new magazine article.

The previously classified incident caused the most significant breach ever to U.S. military computers, William J. Lynn III wrote for an article appearing in the September/October issue of Foreign Affairs magazine.

Titled "Defending a New Domain," the article outlines the evolution of computer network threats and measures the department has put into place to deal with them. The frequency and sophistication of intrusions into U.S. military networks have increased exponentially in the past 10 years, Lynn wrote. They now are probed thousands of times and scanned millions of times, every day, he added.

Sometimes the adversaries are successful, Lynn said, and they have acquired thousands of files from Defense Department networks and those of the Pentagon's industry partners and U.S. allies, including weapons blueprints, operational plans and surveillance data.

To counter the threat, the Pentagon has built "layered and robust defenses" around military networks and created the new U.S. Cyber Command to integrate processes, Lynn said. Department officials are working with their counterparts at the Homeland Security Department, which has jurisdiction over the "dot-com" and "dot-gov" domains, to protect the networks.

The Defense Department has 15,000 networks and 7 million computing devices in use in dozens of countries, with 90,000 people working to maintain them, Lynn said, and it depends heavily on commercial industry for its network operations.

"Information technology enables almost everything the U.S. military does," Lynn wrote, from logistical support and command and control to real-time intelligence and remote operations. Any future conflict will include cybersecurity, he has said.

In his article, Lynn outlines five pillars of the department's emerging cybersecurity policy:

-- Cyber must be recognized as a warfare domain equal to land, sea, and air;

-- Any defensive posture must go beyond "good hygiene" to include sophisticated and accurate operations that allow rapid response;

-- Cyber defenses must reach beyond the department's dot-mil world into commercial networks, as governed by Homeland Security;

-- Cyber defenses must be pursued with international allies for an effective "shared warning" of threats; and

-- The Defense Department must help to maintain and leverage U.S. technological dominance and improve the acquisitions process to keep up with the speed and agility of the information technology industry.

Pentagon officials are developing a cyber strategy document to be released in the fall. It will address, among other things, any statutory changes needed for cyber defense, and the capability for "automated defenses," such as the ability block malware at top speed, Lynn has said.

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WASHINGTON, D.C. - Any talk of coalition forces being unable to succeed in Afghanistan is premature, given that they are just beginning to get all the troops and equipment that President Barack Obama's strategy there calls for, Vice President Joe Biden said today, Aug. 23.

Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of U.S. and international forces in Afghanistan, "now and only now has all the resources that the strategy calls for," Biden said during a speech at the Veterans of Foreign Wars national convention in Indianapolis.

The arrival this month of the last of 30,000 additional troops, as well as other additional resources combined with Petraeus' leadership, puts the coalition's nine-year war in Afghanistan in its best position yet to stamp out radical extremism that led to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks against the United States, the vice president said.

Afghanistan "is the most intractable problem we face, and we needed the best general we have, and now we have him," Biden said. "So folks, don't buy into [the idea] that we've failed in Afghanistan, because we now are only beginning with the right general and the right number of forces to accomplish our objectives."

Biden noted that the drawdown of U.S. forces in Iraq to 50,000 troops at the end of this month will allow for a greater focus on Afghanistan. "After too many years of neglect," he said, "we now are making overall progress to disrupt and defeat the al-Qaida safe haven and reverse the Taliban momentum."

That progress will allow for governance that prompts the will of the Afghan people to reject extremism, Biden said.

"We cannot want peace and security in Afghanistan more than they want it," he said.

The vice president also said it was important for the administration to name July 2011 as the start of the United States' transition out of Afghanistan. However, "we are not leaving in July 2001; it's the start of the transition" that will be decided by conditions on the ground on a province-by-province basis, he said.

"The date is important to tell the Afghans that they must step up; they must exercise sovereignty if they are ever going to prevail," he added.

On Iraq, Biden said he is "absolutely confident that Iraq will form a national government that is able to sustain that country."

Despite the Iranian government spending $100 million to influence Iraq's national elections, Biden said, Iran's influence in Iraq "is minimal," as evidenced by the fact that none of the candidates it backed won in two elections held since March.

Because of the work of U.S. military members under the direction of Army Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, the vice president said, Iraq today is a nearly unrecognizable from the height of violence there in 2007. With the improved security, U.S. forces were able to train 650,000 Iraqi security forces, which now can protect the country, he said.

The security also has led to free elections and government leaders who resolve disputes through negotiations rather than violence, Biden said. The issue of who will lead the national government since no single candidate or party earned a clear victory is being worked out under parliamentary procedures, and will reflect the will of voters, he added.

"In establishing a democracy, the most important election is not the first election," said Biden, who has made 13 trips to Iraq to help with the transition process. "It's the second election."

"Politics is not always pretty," he continued, "but the hard work of forming a new government is well under way, and I personally have made it clear to the leading politicians that it's time for them to match the courage of their citizens by completing the process."

The drawdown to 50,000 U.S. troops, which is expected to be completed next week, "does not mean we are disengaging from Iraq," Biden said. Rather, the United States will have a long-term relationship with Iraq, as reflected by U.S. consulates opening in Iraqi cities, he said.

Nine years of war in Afghanistan and Iraq has produced more than 2 million new war veterans, nearly 40,000 of whom are wounded, Biden said. Of those, some 18,000 will require critical care, at an estimated cost of $7 billion, for the rest of their lives, he noted. Biden pledged that the country would meet their needs, no matter the cost.

"Our nation has only one truly sacred obligation," he said, "and that is to prepare and equip those who we send into harm's way and to care for them and their families when they come home."
Already, Biden said, the Obama administration "is involved in the most comprehensive program ever" to provide for veterans, giving the Veterans Affairs Department a $16 billion budget increase this year and seeking $11 billion next year.

"Whether or not we keep our promise to our veterans will say more about who we are as a nation than anything else we do," he said. "Our service to our veterans is non-negotiable."