Bush plans primetime TV address as six US troops feared dead in Falluja
Julian Borger in Washington
Saturday June 25, 2005
The Guardian](http://www.guardian.co.uk/)
President George Bush will make a primetime appeal to Americans next week to shore up dwindling domestic support for the war in Iraq, where insurgents have inflicted one of their deadliest attacks in months on US forces.
Mr Bush will attempt to persuade an increasingly sceptical public to maintain support for the war in a speech on Tuesday evening at the Fort Bragg army base in North Carolina.
Five marines and a sailor were feared killed in a suicide car bomb attack on a military convoy travelling through Falluja, a Sunni stronghold which US officers had until yesterday presented as an example of successful pacification. The Pentagon reported that women marines were among the dead.
As news broke of the Falluja bomb, Mr Bush was meeting the Iraqi prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, in the White House to discuss the insurgency and political negotiations in the country on a new constitution.
At a joint press conference, the president insisted that progress was being made in Iraq against the insurgents, and again insisted that he would not set a deadline for American withdrawal.
“They’re trying to shake our will,” he said. "And so, of course, we understand the nature of that enemy. We also understand that there is reason to be optimistic about what’s taking place. We’re optimistic that more and more Iraqi troops are becoming better trained to fight the terrorists. We’re optimistic about the constitutional process.
"There are not going to be any timetables. I have told this to the prime minister.
“We are there to complete a mission, and it’s an important mission. A democratic Iraq is in the interests of the United States and it’s in the interests of laying the foundation for peace. And if that’s the mission, then why would you say to the enemy: Here’s a timetable. Just go ahead and wait us out.”
Mr Jaafari thanked the US for its support and promised that Iraqi troops would take on an increasing burden of the combat against the insurgents. “The responsibility in the front line is for the Iraqis, and [the security forces are] making progress, quantitatively and qualitatively.”
However, the continuing violence in Iraq, costing the lives of more than 1,700 US troops, has contradicted the upbeat rhetoric coming from the White House, and sapped public support for American military presence there. Two big opinion surveys in the past week found that 59% of Americans now oppose the war.
The Pew Research Centre also found that the number of Americans in favour of an immediate withdrawal had risen from 36% last October to 42% in February, to 46% now.
Abroad, the Pew Centre found that China was significantly more popular than the US among the populations of America’s traditional allies, including Britain.
“People see disturbing images on their television screens coming out of Iraq,” Scott McClellan, the White House spokesman said yesterday, adding that Mr Bush would seek to bolster support in his Fort Bragg speech. “The president will be talking about the broader view about what we’re trying to achieve there,” he said. “The American people have not really heard the strategy for success in Iraq.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1514388,00.html
I think this post gives some background and sense to Abdullah’s K post earlier.