During a speech last night (transcript) designed to quell the rising doubts about the war in Iraq, President George W. Bush largely said what he was expected to say, that the United States will stay in Iraq and that there will be no timetable for the withdrawal of United States troops. President Bush proposed a two-track strategy for "moving forward" in Iraq. The military component will focus on "defeating terrorists" and training Iraqi forces, echoing themes in previous speeches where President Bush tried to draw direct links between the war in Iraq and al-Qaida. During the speech, Bush made numerous references to "the terrorists" in Iraq and "the terrorists" that attacked the United States on September 11, 2001, despite the fact that no such link exists. There were 34 mentions of "terrorism" and 5 references to September 11. Bush also expressed support for the political process in Iraq, suggesting that the United States will continue to help Iraq become a model of democracy for the Middle East.
Reaction to the speech has been largely negative, with many in the United States criticizing the attempts to link 9/11 and Iraq while Iraqis have also been dismissive of Bush's speech, realizing that it essentially means that the United States occupation will continue indefinitely. Former intelligence analysts have criticized Bush for advancing the notion that the Iraq was somehow directly linked to the September 11 attacks. While the Democratic "opposition" Bush's speech has been fairly limited and focused primarily on his "exploitation" of September 11 and making no call for the end to the occupation of Iraq, independent commentators and analysts have presented what is truly an oppositional view. Commentators have blasted the notion that Bush is "advancing democracy" in the Middle East and the idea that the United States needs to "stay the course." Even soldiers within the military, whom Bush was clearly trying to reach with his appearance at Fort Bragg, were somewhat skeptical of Bush's so-called "strategy" for Iraq.
Moreover, a year after the so-called transfer of sovereignty, for everyone outside of the Bush administration, Iraq remains an ongoing disaster. Independent journalist Patrick Cockburn, recently back from Iraq, described the "bloody mess" that Iraq has become:
The news now from Iraq is only depressing. All the roads leading out of the capital are cut. Iraqi security and US troops can only get through in heavily armed convoys. There is a wave of assassinations of senior Iraqi officers based on chillingly accurate intelligence. A deputy police chief of Baghdad was murdered on Sunday. A total of 52 senior Iraqi government or religious figures have been assassinated since the handover. In June 2004, insurgents killed 42 US soldiers; so far this month 75 have been killed.
The speech was made on the one-year anniversary of the so-called "handover of sovereignty" of Iraq to the Iraqi government. The situation in Iraq over the last year has consistently gotten worse. In a war that has cost the United States nearly $180 billion, at least 22,582 Iraqi civilians have been killed and 1,744 US soldiers have been killed.
