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Put in broad terms, about 50,000 American troops might be needed for the first several years after soft partition was implemented. That would follow, as noted above, the transition period of 12 to 18 months [if the plan is started this fall] when forces would not decline at all from current levels of roughly 150,000 Americans.http://www3.brookings.edu/fp/saban/analysis/june2007iraq_partition.pdf