U.S. Forces On Track To Withdraw From Iraq After 8-Year Presence

SATHER AIR BASE, IRAQ - DECEMBER 03: US Army First Sgt Lazaro Ramos fills out a luggage tag, as American soldiers prepare for flights to Kuwait for their final withdrawal from Iraq at Sather Air Base on December 3, 2011 in Baghdad, Iraq. With less than 12,000 American troops left in Iraq from a peak of more than 170,000, US commanders say they are on track for a total drawdown by December 31, which will end the 8 1/2-year US military presence in Iraq that saw the toppling of Saddam Hussein, a brutal civil war and insurgency, and finally a deadlocked democratic Iraqi government. (Photo by Scott Peterson/Getty Images)