Bush: We Can\'t Jeopardize Gains in Iraq

Bush: We Can't Jeopardize Gains in Iraq

AP   |  JENNIFER LOVEN   |   March 19, 2008 at 10:52 AM


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Remarks of President George Bush
5 Year Anniversary of Iraq War
The Pentagon
Arlington, VA

Read more about Bush's speech marking the five-year-anniversary of the Iraq War below this video excerpt.

WASHINGTON — Five years after launching the invasion of Iraq, President Bush strongly signaled Wednesday that he won't order troop withdrawals beyond those already planned because he refuses to "jeopardize the hard-fought gains" of the past year.

As anti-war activists demonstrated around downtown Washington, the president spoke at the Pentagon to mark the war anniversary. He gave a strong defense of his decision to go to war and continue it and linked the fighting there to the global battle against al-Qaida.

"The battle in Iraq is noble, it is necessary, and it is just. And with your courage the battle in Iraq will end in victory," he told an audience of Pentagon brass, soldiers and diplomats.

Bush made some of his most expansive claims of success in the fighting there. He said the increase of 30,000 troops that he ordered to Iraq last year has turned "the situation in Iraq around." He also said that "Iraq has become the place where Arabs joined with Americans to drive al Qaida out."

"The surge ... has opened the door to a major strategic victory in the broader war on terror," the president said. "We are witnessing the first large-scale Arab uprising against Osama bin Laden, his grim ideology, and his terror network. And the significance of this development cannot be overstated."

Bush appeared to be referring to recent cooperation by local Iraqis with the U.S. military against the group known as al-Qaida in Iraq, a mostly homegrown, though foreign-led, Sunni-based insurgency. Experts question how closely _ or even whether _ the group is connected to the international al-Qaida network. As for bin Laden, he is rarely heard from and is believed to be hiding in Pakistan.

The U.S. has about 158,000 troops in Iraq. That number is expected to drop to 140,000 by summer in drawdowns meant to erase all but about 8,000 troops from last year's increase.

Faster and larger withdrawals could unravel recent progress, Bush said.

"Having come so far and achieved so much, we are not going to let this happen," he said.


 
 

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Bush is like the belligerent drunk friend who keeps convincing us to let him take the wheel while our vehicle is going 90-to-nothing...and even though our automobile is almost totalled, and the remains of thousands of victims are splattered on the hood and windshield, the passengers just can't find the guts to take the wheel back...

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 12:55 PM on 03/20/2008

puzzeled again?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 02:42 AM on 03/20/2008

Well it sound's like you have it all wrong---remember JUST WORDS

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 12:09 AM on 03/20/2008

And we still have not Tried, Prosecuted and Executed Him & Cheney for Treason Yet.
I am sick of watching Top Military Brass be fired or Quit, and Yet remain silent about th eatrocities being committed Against US and around the World by these Men who are stealing our Soveriegnity in the name of a Crazed "New World Order'
These assholes aren't dreaming of Thoreaus Walden, They are Drooling and masterbating over 1984, Over Hitler's Manifesto , over Pink Floyds 'Welcome to the Machine'. Consider these antiquated references, NO Shit! When the Facts Don't support the perception- then your persception is Fucked Up- Duh. I can not comprehend how people can not - or will not- add the lies between the damn dots! Nor how any of these vile beings claiming to be 'Public SErvants' can continue to turn a blind eye and remain silent even if they allow themselves to look upon this BEAST!
Actual I doubt we are as ignorant/ Fearful/Prejudice/Blind as they claim from the BLOWhole of their media Whores. WE are far more alike than we are ALLOWED to discuss. Media is ,and has been, the Mass mind control - the loud speaker repeating the same mind numbing antidotes until they ring in your head like a crappy Product jingle. I've changed the channel. At this point I'm willing to Blame them anything and everything-Rational or Not, they are guilty of at least Capitol Punishment Crime - I have not problem adding 50 more with counts ranging up to the BILLIONS!

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 07:11 PM on 03/19/2008

How about if a member of the Bush family replaces someone having to serve yet another tour?
Even Prince Harry served.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 06:44 PM on 03/19/2008

Guess this is what we get for having a president who is a recovering addict he talk like he live in iraq daily. just he got shite and sunni fighting neighborhood to heighborhood like crips and bloods - progress LOL

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:59 PM on 03/19/2008

Bush and his henchmen, evidently proud of their "accomplishments" in Iraq, are diligently working to ensure that their flawed Iraqi policies will be closely followed and adhered to through future administrations, thus guarenteeing our longterm presence and support in Iraq. They are pursuing this endeavor in spite of negative public and legislative opinions regarding such an underhanded strategy. Therefore, even if Insain McCain loses the general election, we are evidently going to have to deal with the Iraqi mess -- a constant and costly reminder of Bush's disastrous blunder -- for a long, long time.

In order to begin improving our reputation in the world, strengthening our economy, and rebuilding our military, the new democratic president should wipe the slate clean of any lingering and residual Bush policies, and then just start over -- beginning with our steady but significant withdrawel from Iraq, until our troops are completely out of that country...period. Will the country goes to hell in a handbasket when we leave? Who knows. If it does, then we may have to go back in, heaven forbid. However, if we stay, then the Iraqis will forever remain dependant upon our presence there (while we hold their hands and referee their civil war), and we may go bankrupt paying for it. What a fine mess, these Republicans have gotten us into.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:19 PM on 03/19/2008

The picture reminds me of when he was looking underneath the table for WMD's and picked up the table cloth and made the comment - "No, WMD's under there" while troops were dying in Iraq and Afghanistan - this picture should read - "No, fu#@ing brain up there"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 04:03 PM on 03/19/2008

unbelievable.
my gosh, people wherever you are or are from come five years from now, if this debacle, fiasco, catastrophe or whatever you want to call it, we will sit back and be amazed at what little we did and our sons and daughters will wonder what did you do to stop torture? war? the abuse of the geneva convention at abu ghraib and the abuse of power in our country and the shameful trammeling of our constitution? the vast accumulation of wealth by oil companies and their subsidiaries at the expense of our shared and fragile planet? it's all leads to our current economic situation. another fine mess we've gotten ourselves into.
easy for us to say what we would've done to help jews during the rise of hitler. always retrospect: that safe distance where we inure ourselves from our current reality.
we have so much to answer for. so, so much and so little time.
unbelievable.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 04:02 PM on 03/19/2008

There's only 163 posted and 244 pending comments. WOW! Should we call HuffPo Comments section a QUAGMIRE? EH? EH? EH? Or better yet, a SLOG!

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:50 PM on 03/19/2008

It kills me when people talk about how the attacks are down yada yada percent since the worse violence in Iraq. Attacks are up thousands of percentage points since before we occupied Iraq. I saw a documentary on Baghdad hospital and there were Shia after Shia screaming for Saddam to come back. The peoples lives are miserable over there much worse than under Saddam. They have less jobs, less electricity, less clean water and are paying 500% more for gasoline. Come to think of it Bush has done about the same thing to America.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:41 PM on 03/19/2008

This man has clearly demonstrated that he was never qualified for the presidency. Voters who can't see this should be disqualified from voting.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:39 PM on 03/19/2008



Note to George: On this, the 5 year anniversary of YOUR Iraq War, you must remember that, due to the illegal nature of YOUR invasion, there can be no 'success' in this theatre.




    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:20 PM on 03/19/2008

"For the risk that the leader of a third-world state will use biological and/or nuclear weapons against us is the greatest risk that we face" - Madeline Albright.

"Or we can partake of some ambiguous route which will allow him (Saddam) to rebuild his weapons of mass destruction" - Bill Clinton.

"He will rebuild & will again use his weapons of mass destruction" - Howard Dean.

"We have always underestimated the ability of Saddam Hussein to rebuild his weapons of mass destruction" Jay Rockefeller.

"I can support the actions of the President because I think it ot be in the best interests of our nation's long-term security" - Hillary Clinton.

"He cannot be allowed to rebuild his weapons of mass destruction" - John Edwards.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:07 PM on 03/19/2008

It's YOUR war too. Whether you want to admit it. If your a 'PROGRESSIVE (heh)' then your newly elected officials have been voting against YOUR wishes. YOUR Congressmen and Women have been voting consistently for FUNDING and Pres BUSH appointments. YOUR taxes are paying for it. So it's YOUR war, too.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:52 PM on 03/19/2008

in light of the spectacular bush failure, I'm not surprised that you'd want to shift the blame to Liberals.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 06:27 PM on 03/19/2008

It's YOUR WAR.Nobody with any brains would say this war belongs to the American people! This is a war of GREED.Where is the vice president today? He is fishing.....................................................................................With the Saudi's!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:35 PM on 03/19/2008

No its not and if a World Court wanted to put Bush on trial, then I would support it.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:24 PM on 03/19/2008

I would support a war crimes trial too.................................

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:40 PM on 03/19/2008

See, in a direct democracy, it would be my war. But with the power that I have to affect government decisions, I don't think it's right to call it MY war. I didn't support this war; I know SOME of my elected representatives did (thank you, Russ Feingold, for being the ever-intelligent person that you are). However, even assuming that I affect elections (which is only true to a negligible extent), I don't vote - my representative does.

Now, my tax dollars are paying for it. True. I could dodge that, but wouldn't that violate a fundamental law of life ("There are only two certainties in life: death and taxes)?

To take this on a tangent, those conservatives who say, "ok, we f'ed up. But we should worry about the here and now" - I can understand that. But those blind and arrogant (should you be/have been in the administration) enough to say that it was 'worth it' need better cost-benefit analysis skills. I thought conservatives were always touting the market, which assumes rational actors. Isn't this the argument against rational actors PROGRESSIVES (why you used all caps I don't know) have been waiting for?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:03 PM on 03/19/2008

Never have I seen a more honest debate on the "war" in Iraq, than when the voices of the left andt the right have devolved into arguing about who is actually responsible now for pile of stink in the corner.

The reality is, however, that this isn't even a "war." It was an invasion and occupation. Further, it was over before it started in terms of the result.

History is very clear on this point: Short of a willingness and ability to carry out genecide and colonization, occupations are doomed to failure. The locals have no place else to go, and little else to do, except hammer away at the hated occupier until the cost of occupation becomes untenable.

In the meantime, while everyone waits for the final day of withdrawel, for the last helicopter to evacuate the desperate from the embassy, occupations are bloody and extremely costly.

The war in Afghanistan sunk the U.S.S.R.

And now the "war" in Iraq is sinking the U.S.

So now, we argue about who is going to have to clean up the mess.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 04:21 PM on 03/19/2008

Order Of The Illuminati - New World Order

Nearly 200 years ago - The founder of the Roth-Child - banking empire
said - Give me control over a Nations economy - and I care not who writes
the laws !!!!!

Rev. Sun Myung Moon (The Moonies), and
the Unification Church
For those few of you who are not familiar with the Rev. Moon, in the 60s
both he and his Unification Church were universally regarded as a dangerous
cult. The abuse his followers suffered at the hands of their mind manipulating
master is indeed very well established.

His claims include stating that Christ failed His mission, and that Moon
himself is the "new messiah" who is come to fulfill the mission of God. He
also claims that it is his mission to 'unite the world through uniting religious
forces'. But would it shock you to know that nearly all the big name Christian
evangelicals have extremely strong ties to him?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:19 PM on 03/19/2008

is it lying if nobody calls you on it?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:16 PM on 03/19/2008

Shock and Awe run and planned by Dumb and Stupid with Crazy running to extend it for God knows how many years. The Three Trillion dollar boondoggle Brought to you by George Bush and his band of idiots.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:15 PM on 03/19/2008

@cf864

1. You are 10,000 deaths off on the Vietnam total

2. This war has already cost more financially than Vietnam which cost about $133 billion

3. This was has not been on the cheap. It has contributed to the downfall of our economy. The price of a barrell of oil has jumped $80. The U.S. dollar has gone from even with the Euro before the war to 1.60 to the dollar.

4. As China, India, and the EU invest in education and business development our heroes die in Iraq and the war drum for Iran starts

5. Civil liberties have started to be taken away as it was during the Vietnam War. This war is MORE dangerous than Vietnam. The Vietnamese were never going to follow us home or seek revenge.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:14 PM on 03/19/2008

Sixteen Democratic members of the Out of Iraq Caucus stepped up to defend Hillary Clinton"s record on the Iraq war, issuing an open letter Tuesday asserting Clinton is the ideal candidate to bring the war to a "responsible" end.Record shows Obama when faced with tough choices ALWAYS gave in to pressure from the Bush administration and corporate lobbyists .Obamas TRUE, record that he and the media want to hide shows he supports the war!!!!voted twice against bringing America's troops back home. He voted for war appropriations giving our money to Chaney and Halliburton/Blackwater. His latest bit of posturing S 433 allows the Bush Administration to suspend any troop withdrawal!!!!if not suspended, still keeps the troops in Iraq for a long time to come..



Obama voted for Bush's energy bill, sending more than $13 billion in subsidies and tax breaks to oil, coal, and nuclear companies. Obama voted with Republicans to allow credit card companies to raise interest rates way over 30 percent, INCREASING STUDENT LOANS RATES AND FEES increasing hardship for families. Obama voted for one of Bush's top priorities - expanding Nafta to South America - even as President Bush obstructed all the top Democratic priorities. Obama voted with Bush to make it harder for ordinary people to hold big corporations accountable when they do things like sell toxic toys, poisonous pet food, human food or just plain rip you off.Obama also the Senate's biggest Democratic advocate of subsidies for liquid coal, even though liquid coal produces twice the global warming pollution of the crude oil it's meant to replace and voted for increased subsidies, albeit with conditions.Obama, a Hamiltonian believer in free trade and supporters of globalization has lent his support to the "Hamilton Project formed by corporate-neoliberal Citigroup chair Robert Rubin and other 'Wall Street

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:12 PM on 03/19/2008

Why fiddle dee dee....

I'm back after a short break, and Gosh.....there's hardly any of my old pals like Vogon around !

wonder why that is ??

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:07 PM on 03/19/2008

"Obama: McCain Has "Failed To Demonstrate How The War In Iraq Has Made Us Safer"... Trust Me To End The War, Not Hillary...3,990 US Troops Killed... 29,395 Wounded... 2,100 Have Tried To Commit Suicide... 88% Of Military Officers Say War Has Stretched US Thin... 82,000-89,000 Iraqi Casualties... 4,500,000 Iraqi Refugees... Global Terror Incidents From January 2001: 1,188... Global Terror Incidents From January 2006: 5,188"

Where is a similar rundown of Syria's, Saudi Arabia's and Iran's contributions to the war in Iraq over the last 5 years? Not important? No impact on this year's election? Or an intentional omission?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 02:56 PM on 03/19/2008

"
Where is a similar rundown of Syria's, Saudi Arabia's and Iran's contributions to the war in Iraq over the last 5 years? Not important? No impact on this year's election? Or an intentional omission?"

My guess would be intentional omission. It's currently en vogue to only point out the skeletons in USA's closet, while blissfully sweeping every other country's wrongdoing under the rug. This trend started way before 2001.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 01:27 AM on 03/21/2008

The illegal war that little king george started has made us more enemies than ever before in the history of the U.S.We will probably never be safe again..................................................................

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:39 PM on 03/19/2008

82,000-89,000 Iraqi Casualties...........Thats far different then the 650,000+ dead Iraqi's that the leftists on TV use to always scream about. Hell, LBJ killed more Vietnamese civilians just from his B-52 bomb runs.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 04:49 PM on 03/19/2008

You believe MSM. I have some swamp land in Florida for sale too>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:42 PM on 03/19/2008

Yeah, and show how much China, Japan and Arab Countries who are PAYING for this war, including Saudi Arabia... contributed, still contributing, and what they are going to want in reciprocation. Pathetic.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:02 PM on 03/19/2008

How rude of you to ask, DietrichMoody, what China, Japan and Arab Countries are going to want in return for lending the Bush Administration billions to continue their little war.

They would have you believe that there is no quid pro quo.
I suppose that Bush and Co. rationalize that if you voted for them, twice, even after knowing you'd been lied to and stolen from, what's a little favour for a little loan.....between friends??
After all, you believed that an honourable President would never take the country into war except as a last resort, so you'll believe anything.
The Bush Administration is not afraid of the people who elected them.
They should be, but they're not.
Even though YOU are their boss, they know they can do whatever they want, as long as they want, using your money and the lives of your loved ones to do it.
NO??
Then why are they still in the White House, calling the shots?
John McCain, who was slimed by Bush will carry on Bush's policies if he is elected in November.
If he is, America will again have the leaders they deserve.
Sad.

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:32 PM on 03/19/2008

Oh God, this is so romantic, and they said it wouldn't last .

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 02:50 PM on 03/19/2008

Geez, I only posted a response to you an hour ago. Where the heck is it?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:51 PM on 03/19/2008

lol!

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:38 PM on 03/19/2008

War without end, our economy in shambles, our military spent, our treasure wasted, our nation divided. Now, just who is our enemy supposed to be?

    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 03:15 PM on 03/19/2008

There is no such thing as Al Qaeda in Iraq. Al Qaeda in Iraq is a joint Administration-Corporate Media fabrication. Neither party has ever offered any evidence of this phenomena. Why people buy the existence of this phenomena while simultaneously denying the existence of the Easter Bunny is beyond my comprehension.

I, or anyone else reading this for that matter, can produce better video evidence of the Easter Bunny's existence than what the Administration-Corporate Media alliance has used to try to convince us of the existence of Al Qaeda in Iraq.

The key is, you have to stop beli