According to Asharq al-Awsat daily Ryan Crocker, US ambassador to Iraq, said: The United States should learn from experience of withdrawal from Lebanon that turned in favor of the Iranian and Syrian regimes, and not to withdraw from Iraq.

Crocker added: The United States has gained many political and military advantages during past years, and it shouldn’t lose these advantages in such circumstances by early withdrawal from Iraq which would turn Iraq into another Lebanon. The U.S. left Lebanon in early eighties and the Iranian and Syrian governments regarded it as a defeat for the US and then challenged the US policies.