Many military analysts believe that the U.S. military has enough resources on hand to deal with apparently deteriorating security situations in Iraq and Afghanistan. But most of them nonetheless wonder where additional troops would come from if they were needed.

A strong dissenter is retired Army Lt. Gen. William E. Odom, a former director of the National Security Agency. Odom described the attack on Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein as "one of the great strategic errors of the post-Cold War era."

"I think, eventually, the U.S. will have to leave," said Odom, now director of national security studies for the Military Strategic Issues section of the Hudson Institute think tank in Washington. "It's alienated its allies, and it's finding this job is beyond its own troop strength."

Of the Army's 10 active-duty divisions, all but the 25th Infantry Division (Light), based in Hawaii, has served in Iraq or Afghanistan, or is there now. Of the three active-duty Marine divisions, the equivalent of two have served in Iraq or Afghanistan, or are there now.

But retired Marine Col. Mackubin Owens, a professor at the Navy War College at Newport, R.I., described the fighting in Fallujah, northwest of Baghdad, and the rebellion in Baghdad and the country's south by followers of the radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al Sadr as "sort of the last gasp" of the enemies of democracy in Iraq.

Owens' view is largely shared by retired Brig. Gen. David Grange, a former commander of the 1st Infantry Division; by Austin Bay, a retired Army colonel and columnist who teaches national security policy at the University of Texas; and by John Thompson, a former Canadian army officer, who is managing director of the MacKenzie Institute, a Toronto-based think tank that studies global conflicts.

Joe Roche is an Army reservist serving with the 16th Engineer Battalion in Baghdad, one of the units that responded to the attempt Sunday by Sadr's "Mahdi Army" to seize control of Sadr City, the Shiia district in northwest Baghdad named for Sadr's father, a Shiite spiritual leader executed by Saddam.

Roche said the revolt is more an opportunity for the U.S.-led Coalition Provisional Authority than a problem. "I liken this to going in for an operation to remove a small cancer tumor," he said in an e-mail to a web site. "It is a painful and disruptive procedure, but it is necessary to make things better."

In his briefing yesterday, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, commander of coalition ground forces, said his troops were in "firm control" of Baghdad, but acknowledged that Sadr's militia controlled Kut, a village about 90 miles southeast of Baghdad, and the Shiite holy city of Najaf.

Operations to retake Kut are "imminent," Sanchez said. But operations to retake Najaf and capture Sadr, thought to be hiding there, probably will be put off until after the Shiia holy day on Monday has passed.

Owens called Sadr "a bit player." Thompson agreed, saying: "These are not general uprisings. Most of the Shiia are sitting on the sidelines."

Owens, Bay, Thompson and Roche said Sadr -- who wants to create an Iranian-style theocracy in Iraq, and who has received financial support from Iran -- is a problem the United States would have to deal with sooner or later. By launching a coup bid while U.S. troop strength is at its highest, they said, he has given the coalition an opportunity to deal with him well before the June 30 transfer of political authority to the Iraqi Governing Council.

Soldiers of the 1st Armored Division, due to rotate to Germany this month and next, have been told that their Iraq stay would be extended by four months.

With the 1st Armored Division, the United States now has 125,000 troops in Iraq, and allied coalition partners have 20,000 additional troops -- more than enough to deal with the Sunni insurgents in Fallujah and with Sadr's militia.

Experts said that, according to intelligence estimates, the combined strength of those two elements is less than 20,000. The "Mahdi army," moreover, is seen as more mob than army -- no match for well-trained, well-armed U.S. or British troops.

Still, Grange and Bay think more U.S. troops should be sent.