The British may be burning our boats

I've been talking alot about the collapse in Basra, now there's concern that the British might pull out completely.

The Bush administration is becoming increasingly concerned about the impact of an imminent British withdrawal from southern Iraq and would prefer UK troops to remain for another year or two.

There are two aspects of this, 1) There's a serious implication for the intraShia national politics. As Basra becomes hotter, the hopes of a unified Shia front collapses meaning that the politics in Iraq becomes even more impossible.

But, as troubling to me, 2) Think about the complications an unoccupied Basra would provide for a US Army trying to extract itself through Kuwait (and there's not another option.)

(The Telegraph has a rehash of a yesterday's WaPo story on the collapse in Basra, and the Danish are now fully out.)