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03-19-2007, 08:59 AM
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,259525,00.html
WASHINGTON — President Bush marked the fourth anniversary of the war in Iraq on Monday as the White House tried to counter Democratic attempts to force a withdrawal of U.S. troops.
Bush was expected to issue a plea for more patience in the war, which has stretched longer with higher costs than the White House ever anticipated. The president was to make a statement in the Roosevelt Room.
"It can be tempting to look at the challenges in Iraq and conclude that our best option is to pack up and go home," Bush was to say, according to an administration official who saw an advance text of his remarks. "While that may be satisfying in the short run, the consequences for American security would be devastating."
White House press secretary Tony Snow went a step further, telling reporters in his morning briefing that a war spending bill up for consideration by the full House this week would "provide victory for the enemy." The legislation, in addition to providing funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for the year, would effectively require the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq by the fall of 2008.
"That is not a fund-the-troops bill but a withdraw-the-troops bill," Snow said. "We think that is an approach that is conducive to defeat. It is a recipe for failure, not for victory. ... It would provide victory for the enemy and not the much-needed and deserved victory for the people of Iraq. Furthermore, it would forfeit the sacrifice that our troops have made in the field."
The president also was to meet with his National Security Council on the war and hold a closed-circuit television conference call with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in Baghdad.
Entering its fifth year, the war has claimed the lives of more than 3,200 members of the U.S. military.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice earlier Monday staunchly defended going to war but acknowledged the administration should have sent more troops initially to quell the civil strife following the invasion.
Asked on CBS's "The Early Show" to say what the administration could have done better, she said that, early on, officials "might have looked to a more localized, more decentralized approach to reconstruction.
"... And I do believe that the kind of counterinsurgency strategy in which Gen. (David) Petraeus is now pursuing, in which we have enough forces to clear an area and hold it, so that building and governance can emerge, is the best strategy. And that probably was not pursued in the very beginning."
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a persistent critic of the war strategy but a supporter of the war itself, has repeatedly complained that not enough U.S. troops were placed on the ground in the weeks and months following the March 2003 invasion.
Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., also appearing on CBS, maintained that "the only way you end sectarian violence is to occupy a country or have a decentralized government.
WASHINGTON — President Bush marked the fourth anniversary of the war in Iraq on Monday as the White House tried to counter Democratic attempts to force a withdrawal of U.S. troops.
Bush was expected to issue a plea for more patience in the war, which has stretched longer with higher costs than the White House ever anticipated. The president was to make a statement in the Roosevelt Room.
"It can be tempting to look at the challenges in Iraq and conclude that our best option is to pack up and go home," Bush was to say, according to an administration official who saw an advance text of his remarks. "While that may be satisfying in the short run, the consequences for American security would be devastating."
White House press secretary Tony Snow went a step further, telling reporters in his morning briefing that a war spending bill up for consideration by the full House this week would "provide victory for the enemy." The legislation, in addition to providing funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan for the year, would effectively require the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq by the fall of 2008.
"That is not a fund-the-troops bill but a withdraw-the-troops bill," Snow said. "We think that is an approach that is conducive to defeat. It is a recipe for failure, not for victory. ... It would provide victory for the enemy and not the much-needed and deserved victory for the people of Iraq. Furthermore, it would forfeit the sacrifice that our troops have made in the field."
The president also was to meet with his National Security Council on the war and hold a closed-circuit television conference call with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in Baghdad.
Entering its fifth year, the war has claimed the lives of more than 3,200 members of the U.S. military.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice earlier Monday staunchly defended going to war but acknowledged the administration should have sent more troops initially to quell the civil strife following the invasion.
Asked on CBS's "The Early Show" to say what the administration could have done better, she said that, early on, officials "might have looked to a more localized, more decentralized approach to reconstruction.
"... And I do believe that the kind of counterinsurgency strategy in which Gen. (David) Petraeus is now pursuing, in which we have enough forces to clear an area and hold it, so that building and governance can emerge, is the best strategy. And that probably was not pursued in the very beginning."
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a persistent critic of the war strategy but a supporter of the war itself, has repeatedly complained that not enough U.S. troops were placed on the ground in the weeks and months following the March 2003 invasion.
Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., also appearing on CBS, maintained that "the only way you end sectarian violence is to occupy a country or have a decentralized government.