Is pulling put the safest way?

In his campaign Obama said that he planed to pull troops out of Iraq over the course of 16 month,ending around mid-2010. The top two military officials in Iraq have expressed their displeasure towards Obama's timetable. They wish for a longer timetable to help solidify the transition of security control to the Iraqis, their desired timetable is around 23 months long. During the past few months Obama and Robert Gates have been discussing the three different lengths for the timetable to withdraw the troops, these three plans are 16,19 and 23 months, with the joint chiefs of staffs. It has been reported that Obama may reveal that he will go with the 19 month withdrawal timetable on Friday, when he visits military bases in North Carolina. His withdrawal plan will not remove all US troops from Iraq during that time, a small residual force will stay behind to train Iraqi troops and go on some military patrols with their Iraqi counterparts. The official size of the residual force has yet to be determined but early speculations put it between 30,000 and 55,000 troops. The withdrawal of troops from Iraq will finally end the war that has pissed of so the most people since Vietnam and will free up more men and materials for operations in Afghanistan, where Obama is sending 17,00 troops. It seems that Obama is just ending one war to escalate another one.Yet I still feel that this action will go over well with the American public since most hate the war in Iraq and don't even Know that we are still operating in Afghanistan.