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Progress in Iraq Belies Reports of 'Doom and Gloom,' Rumsfeld Contends By Linda D. KozarynAmerican Forces Press Service WASHINGTON, Oct. 31, 2003 – Despite media reports to the contrary, "the situation in Iraq is not doom and gloom," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said here Oct. 30. While the task in Iraq is "difficult, dangerous and complicated," he said, "there has also been impressive progress across a range of coalition activities." The U.S.-led coalition's "remarkable" achievements "dwarf any previous historical experience," Rumsfeld assured about 250 government officials, business and civic leaders gathered at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce for...

UK troops return from Iraq saying Basra improved DHEKELIA, Cyprus (Reuters) - Several hundred British troops returned to their home base in Cyprus in heavy rain Friday after a six-week tour of duty in Iraq that they believe left at least their part of the country in better shape. A British military spokesman said the 325 troops, from the 2nd Battalion Light Infantry, would be replaced by a similar number from Britain and their return did not mark the start of a cut back in the 12,000 British troops in Iraq. The troops were based in and around the southern...

WHILE newspaper and television stories keep us abreast of suicide bombings and the numbers of dead and injured in the Middle East, there is another side to post-war Iraq that has gone virtually unreported abroad. It is a story of slow but steady reconstruction, of the immunisation of children, of the rebuilding of schools and hospitals and of the country’s shattered economy. That is not to downplay the seriousness of the situation in Baghdad and the so-called "Sunni Triangle", merely an acknowledgement that there are two sides to the ledger. "The media reports things that don't work. They report bad...

Detailing Success Doesn't Mean Sugarcoating in Iraq By Jim GaramoneAmerican Forces Press Service WASHINGTON, Oct. 30, 2003 – Detailing successes in Iraq does not mean the Defense Department is trying to put a happy face on the conflict, Defense Secretary Donald. H. Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon press conference today. "Some have said that any statement that raises awareness of these successes is putting an optimistic face on a difficult security situation," he said. "Not so." The secretary said that every time he has discussed the situation in Iraq he has stressed that the situation is dangerous and that...

U.S. Rep. George Nethercutt, R-5th District, who recently returned from a tour of Iraq, delivered an optimistic account yesterday of reconstruction efforts in the country. Nethercutt and 16 other members of Congress went to Iraq in late September. “I think we are making tremendous progress in [Iraq],” said Nethercutt. “The story of what we have done in the post-war period … has been remarkable. … The story is better than we might be led to believe in the news.” Nethercutt portrayed an Iraqi population with optimism similar to his. Although helicopters have been in the skies above Iraq for months,...

...Yet it would be wrong for the United States to conclude, as its enemies no doubt hope it will, that the time has come to embrace an exit strategy. There is no basis to believe that the U.S. goals of stabilizing Iraq under a representative government cannot be achieved. In much of the country there is little violence and coalition authorities have the support of most of the population. Even in Baghdad, there has been measurable progress in recent months: More power is on, the curfew is lifted, streets and shops are usually full. Most important, the coalition authority and...

While we do not yet know who was responsible for the latest series of attacks across Iraq, there is no question that some of the bombings — including, American officials suspect, the missile attack on the hotel where Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was staying — were the work of forces loyal to Saddam Hussein. That these terrorists, mostly Sunni Muslims from the so-called Sunni Triangle northwest of Baghdad, retain a stubborn fealty to the former dictator seems to puzzle the coalition leadership. But it should not: their loyalty is rooted in part in centuries-old tribal kinship and religious identity....

Office of the Press SecretaryOctober 27, 2003 President Bush, Ambassador Bremer Discuss Progress in Iraq Remarks by the President and Special Envoy to Iraq, Ambassador Bremer, in Photo Opportunity The Oval Office 9:04 A.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT: Good morning, everybody. I'll share a few words and then answer a couple of questions. First, Ambassador Bremer and General Abizaid have been briefing the Secretary of Defense and my national security team, General Myers, about the situation in Iraq. We spent time talking about the success of the donors conference, the fact that the world community is coming together to help build...

US Congresswomen Champion Women's Issues in IraqBy Lawrence MorahanCNSNews.com Senior Staff WriterOctober 27, 2003 (CNSNews.com) - Iraqi women are fed up with being treated as second-class citizens and are ready to play a more vital role in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, a congresswoman who took part in a recent fact-finding tour of the country told CNSNews.com. Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-N.Y.) said an all-women bipartisan congressional group conducted a tour of Iraq this week to examine, among other issues, the plight of women in Iraq. "Some people will call it women's issues," McCarthy said in a teleconference call from Kuwait. "I...

The Left’s near monopoly over the institutions of opinion and information—which long allowed liberal opinion makers to sweep aside ideas and beliefs they disagreed with, as if they were beneath argument—is skidding to a startlingly swift halt. The transformation has gone far beyond the rise of conservative talk radio, that, ever since Rush Limbaugh’s debut 15 years ago, has chipped away at the power of the New York Times, the networks, and the rest of the elite media to set the terms of the nation’s political and cultural debate. Almost overnight, three huge changes in communications have injected conservative ideas...

WASHINGTON -- President Bush said Monday that U.S. progress in Iraq is making insurgents more "desperate" and spurring attacks such as the bombings at the international Red Cross headquarters and four police stations across Baghdad that killed dozens of people. "The more progress we make on the ground, the more free the Iraqis become, the more electricity that's available, the more jobs are available, the more kids that are going to school, the more desperate these killers become," Bush told reporters at the White House. He said those who are continuing to engage in violence "can't stand the thought of...

    BAGHDAD, Iraq -- A stone's throw from the convention center where hunkered-down U.S. officials drive home a daily message that postwar Iraq is improving, Governing Council members come and go from a guesthouse used by the former regime and strive to make that message a reality.     It's a challenge. Ordinary Iraqis think the 25-member council dominated by former exiles doesn't represent them. The council got off to a rocky start when its U.S.-picked members couldn't even agree on a council president. Instead, they chose a rotating presidency that would ensure each of Iraq's ethnic and religious groups...

Iraqis Strive for Progress in Economic Sphere By Jim GaramoneAmerican Forces Press Service WASHINGTON, Oct. 23, 2003 – National leaders have said many times that to make progress in Iraq, three areas have to move ahead together: security, political and economic progress must go hand-in-hand. DoD highlighted progress in the economic sphere Oct. 22 with a briefing here by members of the Iraqi Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs. The ministry is working to build a jobs program for the country. Iraq was a command economy. The Baathist central government ran everything, and all decisions were made in Baghdad....

BAGHDAD, Oct 22 (AFP) - The rush of the Iraqis to buy imported products since the opening up of the economy after the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime has brought bliss to shopowners, but real danger to local industry already in bad shape. Iraqis making money from working with the US-led coalition, civil servants who returned to their jobs and newly returned exiles have all contributed to a buying spree for imported electric appliances, cars and liquor. "Business is very good. We are earning 10 times more than under the Saddam Hussein" regime, said Samir Majid, an electric appliances shop...

WASHINGTON — The United States has no yardstick for measuring progress in the war on terrorism, has not "yet made truly bold moves" in fighting al-Qaeda and other terror groups, and is in for a "long, hard slog" in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a memo that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld sent to top-ranking Defense officials last week. Rumsfeld discussed various topics including the situation in Iraq and troop morale during a news conference at the Pentagon Thursday. Despite upbeat statements by the Bush administration, the memo to Rumsfeld's top staff reveals significant doubts about progress in the struggle against...

Washington (CNSNews.com) - While most Iraqi cities remain extremely dangerous places, progress in reconstruction and services by Iraqis and Americans since the ouster of Saddam Hussein suggests the country is farther on its way to self-government than recent media reports indicate, U.S. officials said Friday. Christopher Spear, assistant secretary for policy at the Department of Labor, said a majority of Iraqis report they are better off now than they were under the regime of Saddam Hussein, and their cooperation with the American-led coalition proves this. "When you get out and work with these people - the smiles that you see,...

KOROLEV, Moscow reg, October 20 (Itar-Tass) - The Soyuz and Progress spacecraft construction financial situation is catastrophic, the Energia rocket and space corporation' s head Yuri Semyonov told a press conference in the Mission Control Centre after the successful docking of the Soyuz TMA-3 with the International Space Station. The corporation has received no finances promised for the second half of this year, but it has taken big loans to be repaid from the funds. The corporation administration did not focus attention on the issue before the blast-off and the docking, but has to inform its partners now that there...

FORT BRAGG, N.C. - 'This may not be Vietnam, but boy, it sure smells like it," said Sen. Tom Harkin recently. The Iowa Democrat is but one of a host of critics in Washington politics and the media who claim that US troops and administrators are "bogged down" in Iraq. Having covered the war as an embedded reporter, having conducted the first national poll of the Iraqi people (in concert with Zogby International), and having remained in close touch with the military men and women who are temporarily the princes running the land of the Tigris and Euphrates, I believe...

Since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1...the first battalion of the new Iraqi Army has graduated and is on active duty·   Since President  Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1... over 60,000 Iraqis now provide security to their fellow citizens.Since  President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1...nearly all of Iraq’s 400 courts are functioning.  Since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1... the Iraqi judiciary is fully independent.Since President Bush declared an end to major combat on May 1...on Monday, October 6 power generation hit...

Kerik Takes Aim at Media Coverage of Iraq Stewart StogelThursday, October 16, 2003New York -- "The political criticism (on Iraq) in this country is becoming our enemy's best friend," Bernard Kerik told his audience at the Harvard Club in midtown Manhattan Wednesday evening. The former NYPD commissioner and police advisor to Coalition chief L. Paul Bremer, continued: "They only know and see the criticisms...for our people on the ground in Iraq it is not a good thing and hopefully at some point in time someone is going to see it and realize it and stop it..." Kerik, back in NYC...