BAGHDAD (Reuters) — Pulling American troops out of combat in Iraq would reduce US casualties, but doing it too soon could spark a firestorm of unrestrained sectarian violence that will sorely test the loyalties of the Iraqi army.The Iraq Study Group, a high-level panel reviewing America’s policy in Iraq, said yesterday US troops should accelerate training of Iraqi forces so that US forces can gradually move into a supporting role and withdraw from the daily fighting.

Military analysts interviewed ahead of the report’s release cautioned that such a proposal was fraught with peril when viewed against the backdrop of sectarian and insurgent violence that has defied previous US and Iraqi efforts to rein it in.

“The short term will see a drop in (US) casualties. But the military consequence of pulling back will be to cede the initiative to the enemy and to reduce the patrol presence that keeps enemy activity down,” said Stephen Biddle of the US Army War College Strategic Studies Institute.

“Regular US patrols are keeping the level of the violence down. If we stop doing that patrolling the violence is going to get worse.”

A US troop pullback could have merit if it is done as a threat to increase Washington’s leverage on the Shi’ite-led government, still dependent on US firepower, to force a political compromise with minority Sunnis, he said.

That echoes the Iraq Study Group’s suggestion that the United States should begin to withdraw support if Iraq’s government does not make major progress towards national reconciliation, improved security and better governance.

While the United Nations estimates that some 120 people die violently every day in Iraq, the fear is the death toll would be far higher if US troops hunkered down in their bases and removed one of the last checks on roving sectarian death squads.

But President George W. Bush is under pressure to change course in an unpopular war that has killed more than 2,900 American soldiers so far, despite his insistence that US forces will stay until their mission is complete.

Duncan Anderson, head of the war studies department at Britain’s Sandhurst military academy, said if Bush accepted the proposal to begin withdrawing troops from combat, then this should be done gradually while accelerating training of the fledgling Iraqi army, and paying soldiers on time.

“We should have Coalition forces for some months to come while we ramp up training of Iraqi forces. There has to be a phased withdrawal,” he said.

Anderson, who was in Iraq this summer to train Iraqi army officers, said the training and support that US-led forces had provided the Iraqis so far was “not what it should be”, although those officers he saw were “pretty good”.

He said the number of trainers embedded in Iraqi units should also be “increased considerably”. “This gives them some steel and sends a signal they have not been abandoned.”

But others say that placing too much emphasis on training the mainly Shi’ite army, which Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said last week would be ready to take control of national security next June, ignores the fact that the country is in the midst of a deepening conflict that pits Shi’ites against Sunnis.

“We can train Iraqis to be better soldiers but it is not proven we can train them to be better Iraqis. They will still be loyal to communities and tribes rather than central government,” said Loren Thompson, defence analyst at the Lexington Institute.

While Maliki has pushed Washington to accelerate training of his forces and hand over security control, their ability to fill the security vacuum is questionable, despite efforts by US generals to publicly boost the image of the new recruits.

“Even if you’ve got an effective military you still have the problem that that amounts to arming one of the two sides in the civil war. And as the death toll rises the military will takes sides among the militias ... and splinter,” warned Biddle.