The Christian Science Monitor - The shrinking US military footprint here is particularly evident in this community south of Baghdad, where a few dozen American soldiers live among 1,000 Iraqi troops in an area crucial to Baghdad's security.

The Christian Science Monitor - Tony Blair began his leadership as a dashing popular British Bill Clinton -- a fresh answer to “the suit,” as Fleet Street called John Major. After 2001, it all went sideways and Mr. Blair’s 10-year tenure terminated with him portrayed at home as a “lap dog” for President George Bush.

AFP - Iraq cannot yet sustain its army despite having managed to quell a violent insurgency, US and local commanders told AFP, raising the prospect that American troops will stay on beyond 2011.

AP - Even as President Barack Obama was announcing the end of combat in Iraq, American soldiers were sealing off a northern village early Wednesday as their Iraqi partners raided houses and arrested dozens of suspected insurgents.

Time.com - President Obama's Oval Office address indicated that the Iraq withdrawal would lead to more forces for Afghanistan. But Afghans only see an eventual withdrawal from their own troubled country