White House Officials Say Iraq Is Improving
Saturday, October 11, 2003
Using the final day of the business week to defend the Bush administration's "first-strike doctrine," several top White House officials spoke out Friday to defend U.S. military action in Iraq.
The remarks — given by Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and the top U.S. general in Iraq — came as two more U.S. soldiers were killed in Iraq.
The soldiers were the victims of an ambush Thursday night in a Baghdad neighborhood, military officials said.
Read about the ambush of U.S. soldiers.
The public relations campaign was an attempt by the Bush administration to deflect criticism of the government's handling of post-war Iraq and downplay reports of infighting over Iraqi policy among Bush officials in Washington.
Rumsfeld told Fox News that most of violence in Iraq was happening in Baghdad, where the majority of reporters have been stationed since the combat phase of the war ended in April.
"It's an accurate representation of what people are seeing, but it happens to be a relatively narrow slice of what we're seeing in Iraq," Rumsfeld told Fox News. "Baghdad is the most difficult situation we've got. The situation is better in the north, better in the south."
The defense secretary downplayed a Friday New York Daily News report of clashes among Bush administration cabinet leaders and the president's disappointment in the work he's done as head of defense.
"I think it's been blown significantly out of proportion," Rumsfeld said. "The National Security Council is doing what its charter said it should do: coordinate among the various agencies. This problem we're wrestling with in Iraq is about Iraq. It's not about the people in the National Security Council."
Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, Iraq's top U.S. general, said during an exclusive interview with Fox News in Baghdad that the climate in Iraq had changed for the better.
"This is a place of freedom, not a place of fear like it used to be," Sanchez said. "We have to tell the American and the international community that a large part of that blanket of fear is gone from this country and the people are back to living."
He acknowledged that problems remain, but he said those were to be expected.
"There are still attacks going on. We are still in a low-intensity conflict and we will be for a while. We will continue to take some casualties but we need to stay committed," Sanchez told Fox. "This is clearly a battle ground in the global war on terrorism and Americans will win here."
Also on Friday, during a speech at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., Rumsfeld told the audience of 500 that he was surprised by the effectiveness of Saddam Hussein's loyalists to sustain the Iraq conflict long after the end of major combat.
He called the continuing fighting serious but described it as low intensity. He said coalition forces made 1,700 patrols daily in Iraq and only a tenth of 1 percent of those involved any kind of armed conflict.
"It is a very low-intensity situation, percentage-wise. Nonetheless, people are getting killed," Rumsfeld said.
Fear instilled in the Iraqi people by the ousted leader's former paramilitary force is contributing to the situation, he said.
Rumsfeld also called the coalition's achievements in Iraq impressive, listing the opening of schools, hospitals and a new central bank.
"These are things that took a year, two years, five years, 14 years in Germany after World War II and in Japan after World War II, and they're being done in a matter of months," he said.
Cheney, in a speech to the Heritage Foundation in Washington, said the war with Iraq is part of a larger fight against terrorism across the world.
Read more about Cheney's comments.
"Some claim we should not have acted because the threat from Saddam Hussein was not imminent," Cheney said Friday. "Terrorist enemies of our country hope to strike us with the most lethal weapons known to man, and it would be reckless in the extreme to rule out action and save our worries until the day they strike."
He said doing nothing is not the answer.
"It comes down to a choice between actions that ensure our security and inaction that allows danger to grow," the vice president said.
And on Thursday, President Bush had no apologies for the U.S. approach to the situation in Iraq.
Read more about Bush's speech.
"This is a new kind of war and we must adjust ... and America's following a new strategy," he said. "We're not waiting for further attacks. We're striking our enemies before they can strike us again.…Wars are won on the offensive."
Fox News' Mike Tobin in Baghdad, Tony Snow in Washington and The Associated Press contributed to this report. |
