hunterdbk
06-05-2007, 11:38 AM
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070605/ap_on_re_eu/gates_iraq
"We would certainly be happier if there were faster progress on the political front," Gates told reporters during a joint news conference with Kyrgyz Defense Minister Ismail Isakov. He noted that the Iraqis had missed a May 31 deadline for passing a hydrocarbons law — one of many political obstacles yet to be overcome.
Gates was asked whether it appeared to him that U.S. and Iraqi forces were making slower-than-expected progress in establishing security in Baghdad neighborhoods, as news reports have indicated in recent days. He said he had not seen any early projections by Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq (http://search.news.yahoo.com/search/news/?p=Iraq), of how many neighborhoods were expected to be cleared of insurgents by this point.
"So I'm not in a position to judge whether that is faster or slower than General Petraeus anticipated," he said. "If it's slower it's clearly because al-Qaida and others are trying to make as much difficulty as possible for us and for the Iraqi government."
Petraeus, meanwhile, said it was too early to judge whether the U.S. counterinsurgency push, which required the addition of about 30,000 extra U.S. troops, is working. "We haven't even started the surge, the full surge, yet so I'll answer that in September," when he is scheduled to report to Washington on the operation, he said.
"In about two weeks or so we'll have all of the forces for the surge, all the combat forces, on the ground and you're going to see the launch of a number of different operations in a number of areas to go after al-Qaida and other extremist elements," Petraeus said in an interview aired Tuesday on CBS' "The Early Show."
"We would certainly be happier if there were faster progress on the political front," Gates told reporters during a joint news conference with Kyrgyz Defense Minister Ismail Isakov. He noted that the Iraqis had missed a May 31 deadline for passing a hydrocarbons law — one of many political obstacles yet to be overcome.
Gates was asked whether it appeared to him that U.S. and Iraqi forces were making slower-than-expected progress in establishing security in Baghdad neighborhoods, as news reports have indicated in recent days. He said he had not seen any early projections by Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq (http://search.news.yahoo.com/search/news/?p=Iraq), of how many neighborhoods were expected to be cleared of insurgents by this point.
"So I'm not in a position to judge whether that is faster or slower than General Petraeus anticipated," he said. "If it's slower it's clearly because al-Qaida and others are trying to make as much difficulty as possible for us and for the Iraqi government."
Petraeus, meanwhile, said it was too early to judge whether the U.S. counterinsurgency push, which required the addition of about 30,000 extra U.S. troops, is working. "We haven't even started the surge, the full surge, yet so I'll answer that in September," when he is scheduled to report to Washington on the operation, he said.
"In about two weeks or so we'll have all of the forces for the surge, all the combat forces, on the ground and you're going to see the launch of a number of different operations in a number of areas to go after al-Qaida and other extremist elements," Petraeus said in an interview aired Tuesday on CBS' "The Early Show."