Deadline on Troop Withdrawal Sends the Wrong Message, Bush Says

Announcing a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq would send the wrong message to the troops, to Iraq, and to terrorists, President Bush said Tuesday.

Responding to calls by a number of lawmakers and other critics, Bush assured Americans in a televised speech delivered at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, that the troops would not remain one day longer than needed.

But setting a deadline for their withdrawal would be "a serious mistake," he said. "Setting an artificial timetable would send the wrong message to the Iraqis who need to know that America will not leave before the job is done," the president said.

"It would send the wrong message to our troops, who need to know that we are serious about completing the mission they are risking their lives to achieve. And it would send the wrong message to the enemy who would know that all they have to do is to wait us out."

President Bush described Iraq as the "latest battlefield" in the global war on terror - a war that reached U.S. soil on Sept. 11, 2001.

"Many terrorists who kill innocent men, women, and children on the streets of Baghdad are followers of the same murderous ideology that took the lives of our citizens in New York, in Washington, and Pennsylvania," Bush said. "There is only one course of action against them: to defeat them abroad before they attack us at home."

Bush said the mission in Iraq is clear: "We're hunting down the terrorists. We're helping Iraqis build a free nation that is an ally in the war on terror. We're advancing freedom in the broader Middle East. We are removing a source of violence and instability, and laying the foundation of peace for our children and our grandchildren."

He said although progress has been made, there's a lot more work to do, and he said the "strategy going forward" is both military and political:

"The principal task of our military is to find and defeat the terrorists, and that is why we are on the offense. And as we pursue the terrorists, our military is helping to train Iraqi security forces so that they can defend their people and fight the enemy on their own. Our strategy can be summed up this way: As the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down," Bush said.

Reaction to the president's speech fell predictably along party lines. House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) said, "The president is right - we cannot allow the terrorists to shake our resolve."

And like the president, he tied the war in Iraq to the attacks on U.S. soil: "If there is any doubt why we are in Iraq, one must only remember the events of September 11th, when the terrorists attacked our nation. We took the war to the terrorists, rather than waiting for them to attack again," Hastert said.

"Stopping evil will require bringing stability throughout the Middle East. It won't be easy, but it is a fight the United States must continue -- and win."

Hastert called it "unfortunate" that "many Democratic leaders have chosen to politicize the war on terror and ignore the good work that our armed services are doing."

One of those Democrat leaders, Nancy Pelosi of California, did not like what she heard from President Bush on Tuesday night:

"The president missed an opportunity tonight for straight talk to the American people," she said, adding that he should have given Americans "specifics" (including "performance benchmarks") regarding "a strategy for success in Iraq."

Pelosi also criticized President Bush's "frequent references to the terrorist attacks of September 11," saying those references "show the weakness of his arguments. He is willing to exploit the sacred ground of 9/11, knowing that there is no connection between 9/11 and the war in Iraq."

[The Washington Post, in a Wednesday editorial, said the connection between the war in Iraq and the Sept. 11 attack "is not spurious, even if Saddam Hussein was not a collaborator of al Qaeda: Clearly Iraq is now a prime battlefield for Islamic extremists, and success or failure there will do much to determine the outcome of the larger struggle against them."]

Like Democrat Sen. John Kerry, Pelosi criticized President Bush for turning Iraq into a "magnet for terrorism," because, she said, he invaded Iraq without a clear idea of the consequences.

"Our commitment in Iraq does not have to be measured by timetables, but neither can it be open-ended," Pelosi concluded. "The president must still do what he did not do tonight -- lay out clearly the task that remains for the United States in Iraq and how it is to be accomplished."

Ah, now I get it. The MSM has not reported any of the good news out of Iraq, so she doesn't know that we have been doing good things there. The remedy is simple: she should read freerepublic and listen to fox news more often. That should make her happy. ;)

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