Iraq will ask US troops to stay post-2011, says Panetta

Drag it out some more eh?
It is obvious that the Iraqi security forces are better than they were, they still are way to immature to protect Iraq on their own.
but the bigger problem is the people they are protecting against.
How are you supposed to defend against the members of Al Qaida when they blend in with your neighbors?
Regardless of whether we are there or not Iraq will always be violent.

BBC
Iraq will ask the US to keep troops in the country beyond an end-of-2011 pullout deadline, says the nominee to be the next US defence secretary.

Outgoing CIA director Leon Panetta said he had "every confidence that a request like that will be forthcoming".

Mr Panetta was speaking at a US Senate committee considering his nomination.

The US currently has about 47,000 troops in Iraq, none in a combat role. Under a 2008 deal, they are expected to leave by 31 December 2011.

"It's clear to me that Iraq is considering the possibility of making a request for some kind of [troop] presence to remain there [in Iraq]," Mr Panetta told the Senate Armed Services Committee on Thursday.

He said that whether that happened depended on what Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki might ask for.

But if Baghdad did make such a request, he added, Washington should say yes.