Update from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

MR. DENIG: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Washington Foreign Press Center. Welcome also to journalists in our New York Foreign Press Center. We are very pleased this afternoon to be able to welcome back to our podium General Richard Myers, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who is going to provide us with an update. He'll have an opening statement to make and, after that, will be very happy to take your questions.

General Myers.

GEN MYERS: Well, good afternoon and thank you, Paul and everybody, for allowing me to come over here today. It's always a great opportunity to talk to our international friends.

First, I'd like to extend my sincere condolences to those families and friends who have lost a loved or been wounded as a result of acts of violent extremists. In London, as in many other places, these acts are, in my view, crimes against civilization, crimes against humanity, and therefore we've got to continue to deal with this enemy, to continue to fight in many cases this enemy, and we're doing that in many cases with many of our international partners around the world.

In my view, "terrorist" is way too kind a name for individuals like these. These are murderers -- obviously, in many cases, psychopaths as well -- who strike without warning and without regard for human life in hopes that they can intimidate innocent people. But it's backfiring on them. We won't be intimidated. And through global and unified efforts, and not just military efforts, these violent extremists will be defeated.

The coalition in Afghanistan is strong, with 40 nations involved in Operation Enduring Freedom and NATO's International Security Assistance Force in Kabul and the north and the west of that country. And in a like vein, there are 34 countries and NATO supporting our efforts in Iraq. Progress in both Afghanistan and Iraq continues, thanks to the assistance from the international community and their efforts to support the economic, political and security efforts in those countries.

In recent months, two Iraqi brigades have taken over responsibility for two sectors in Iraq, one in north Baghdad, the other near Kirkuk. And just yesterday, the El Salvadoran army turned over control of a section in a central south are in Iraq to an Iraqi army battalion. This is an area just southeast of Baghdad. So that's three instances now where security operations in the country of Iraq have been turned over to Iraqi armed forces: Kirkuk, north Baghdad and now in a city just southeast of Baghdad.

This is significant because it demonstrates that yet another unit is capable of planning and executing and sustaining operations with some level of coalition support.

As you all know, we are approaching some key political milestones in both of these countries, Iraq and Afghanistan. We look forward to the Iraqi draft constitution next month, which will be voted on in October and will set the stage for elections under that new constitution for a permanent government in December of this year.

And as you know as well, the Afghan people will conduct their national and provincial elections in mid-September.

This is a great testament to the determination of the citizens of these countries who are committed to the political progress and political process and strive for a free and representative government.

It's my view that it's the success of the political process that will defeat violent extremists in the end -- and not just in those two countries. And the U.S. and its coalition partners are committed to seeing that that happens.

And with that, we'll take questions.

MR. DENIG: Let me ask you to keep your questions brief so we can maximize them, wait for the microphone and identify yourself and your news organization. Let's start over there, third row, Japan.

QUESTION: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. General Myers. I am Tad Tabata, TV Asahi, Japanese TV network. I have a question on North Korea.

How do you expect the outcome of six-party talks which will be held in Beijing at the end of July, particularly on the North Korea's ballistic missile issue? What will be the substantial progress for United States as well as Japan? You know, DIA Director Mr. Jacoby said several months ago that North Korea had capability of conveying nuclear bomb to the United States homeland.

GEN MYERS: Well, how the talks will come out, I don't know. As you know, our Secretary of State, Secretary Rice, just returned from the region, where she had very good talks, I believe, and we do know that six-party talks are scheduled, as you said. The outcome, I don't think anybody can predict. We have not been able to predict that yet.

The seriousness of the issue, though, which you spoke to as well, is one that we should all ponder fairly carefully. When you have a country such as North Korea that has proliferated in the past and that can produce and proliferate missile technology, that deals in drugs and counterfeiting to provide income and certainly has nuclear fissile material, and it's the proliferation of the latter, I think, that should worry every citizen on this planet. It's a very dangerous thing. There are people that are willing to spend lots of money to get their hands on fissile material, either for a nuclear weapon or a radiological device that would have the impact of at least harming probably lots of people and making some areas uninhabitable for some length of time. So it's a serious issue. I hope they come out well. That's a good question for somebody like Secretary Rice, not for somebody in uniform. And I think that all the parties, all the six parties, are very serious about a nuclear-free peninsula.

QUESTION: Michael Backfisch, Germany's business daily Handelsblatt.

General, you said that three Iraqi brigades took over responsibility in Iraq. As a result of that, how many Iraqis are capable to fight the insurgency at this point in time independently from coalition troops? And secondly, how do you evaluate the memo of the UK Government that the U.S. might reduce its forces by half until 2006?

GEN MYERS: Okay, I probably misspoke. We've had two Iraqi brigades, and then the last one I mentioned was an Iraqi battalion that took over for the location where El Salvador had its forces.

We have developed and will continue to develop ways to measure the Iraqi security forces, and to some extent the Iraqi police capability, to deal with this insurgency on its own. Here we have a case where areas have been given over, and that is the pattern you will see. In some cases, you know, they're going to need coalition support for some time. In other cases, they will not. But there's a lot more that goes into capability than just the troops themselves. There's the ministries -- the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Interior -- that has to provide all the rest of the support that goes into supporting these units, the logistics trains and all the rest of that, and command and control. So we're working on all those levels.

But we've got over 170,000 now trained and equipped, a hundred battalions in the Iraqi armed forces, and they're coming online to be able to handle the situation on their own. I mean, they're all being effective. There's nobody, except those that are just forming -- but they're all effective to some degree in countering the insurgency or protecting infrastructure or protecting individuals. I mean, they all have some degree of effectiveness. And it's going to be -- you know, this is a pace we've been on. We've said this is how it was going to happen. We've briefed that we're going to turn over Iraqi territory to Iraqis because, in the end, they've got to be the one providing the security. I gave you three cases where it's happened. North Baghdad was several months ago, Kirkuk more recently, and then just yesterday, on the 13th of July, this area southeast of Baghdad. I think that says it all. That's exactly what we're doing.

Now, on to the UK memo. I don't know if it's authentic. I've seen the memo as purported to be authentic in the newspapers. It's a planning document. You know, we've been planning all along. We plan. We plan on these sorts of issues all the time. That's what we do, particularly on the Joint Staff in conjunction with General Abizaid and our Central Command and with the Secretary of Defense and his staff. And we have a plan where, if we need to add more forces for certain events, we can do that. If we need to have an off ramp where we can decrease our forces because the Iraqis are capable and taking over parts of their own security, then we can take an off ramp, too.

So there is no set timetable for the reduction of U.S. forces, and for that matter for coalition forces, for most of our coalition partners. And we're going to go [based] on events on the ground and on the ability -- when the ability of the Iraqi security force is such that they can take over their own security, then you'll see more of what just happened yesterday just southeast of Baghdad. You'll see more of that. But there's no timetable, "next year we'll be down to some number." That is not how we operate at all.

QUESTION: Thank you. Wajd Waqfi, Al Jazeera Television. During the recent months in Afghanistan, rebels from the Taliban have launched a new offensive and in the past two weeks 19 U.S. troops have been killed in Afghanistan. How do you evaluate the situation of the American troops in Afghanistan and do you expect more attacks by those rebels leading up to the elections in September?

GEN MYERS: To the last part of that, certainly, I think, as we have seen consistently in Afghanistan and Iraq, as you get close to elections, that those who do not want free and fair elections in Afghanistan and Iraq, you see an increase in the violence. I mean, that's just been the typical pattern. And we anticipate that in Afghanistan and I would anticipate that as we go towards the constitutional referendum in Iraq. I think we'll see an increase, and then as we get to further elections in Iraq, I think you'll see another increase like we did last January. There was a huge spike in January in terms of the total number of incidents in Iraq in the month preceding elections.

You're right, we lost 19 really great Americans in Afghanistan and it was the result of, as you know, the helicopter crash with 16 and then three people on the ground. And the way I evaluate that is it's certainly a tragedy, but if you base how you think things are going in Afghanistan on one incident, or maybe two incidents in that case, I don't think that gives you a very good picture. The al-Qaida basically does not operate in Afghanistan, although they'll make attempts because they stay on the border areas between Afghanistan and Pakistan. They'll make attempts, I think, to thwart progress in Afghanistan.

Certainly, there are remnants of Taliban, well-trained, good fighters, been fighting for a long time, very capable, that will -- that are currently pretty much staying to the hills. But they will try to disrupt things. They haven't been able to disrupt things yet. They are certainly no stronger today -- in fact, weaker today -- than they have been because we've kept the pressure on them both in Afghanistan and Iraq. So they're not any stronger.

So my guess is the impact on the parliamentary and provincial elections in Afghanistan will be virtually nil. It'll be like last time. They'll be successful, and we'll have a parliament in Afghanistan, and progress will continue in that country. I would predict the same thing for Iraq.

There's more to this, of course, than just security forces, just than having soldiers out there guarding things. It's also the will of the people. If we just transport ourselves back to Afghanistan after the presidential elections, where people -- and particularly women in a couple of cases that I know of -- who were threatened to death decided to vote anyway, saying, in effect, "if I die, I'm dying doing what I want to do." And of course, we remember Iraq and all the ink-stained fingers. So that spirit is going to carry these countries through. We, along with our Afghan partners, our coalition partners, our Iraqi partners, are going to try to provide the setting in which that progress can take place.

QUESTION: Reha Atasagun with Turkish Television TRT.

So far, no military or non-military action has been taken against the Kurdish terrorist organization named the PKK in northern Iraq and they have been increasing their attacks to Turkey. And this is kind of encouraging them, I suppose. But what would your approach be if Turkey deems necessary, as it did before in the past, to mount cross-border raids?

GEN MYERS: I think the difference now is that they're dealing with a sovereign Iraqi Government, and a lot of these discussions will have to occur between Turkey and Iraq, not between Turkey and the United States. We -- the U.S. and Turkey -- are working on this issue in several different ways, which I can't go into for operational security reasons, but we're working this issue. The EU and the United States both have the PKK on the terrorist list. They have killed Turkish citizens inside Turkey. And you're absolutely right, you know it better than I do, that they have picked up their activity recently. And this is another example of violent extremists that are somewhat indiscriminate in the way they attack things. So we're trying to work with Turkey, U.S. and Turkey, on the issue. And I would think that Iraq would have a lot to say about any Turkish cross-border operations into the sovereign country of Iraq. That'd be something you'd want to work with Iraq.

There's a lot of need for security forces right now in Iraq and a lot of things to do, and so it's a matter of having the time and the resources to get to some of these problems. But that kind of behavior is certainly not acceptable and, in my view, will eventually be eliminated.

MR. DENIG: The gentleman in the middle row.

QUESTION: Zaher Imadi, Syrian News Agency.

So the Syrian Government have taken decisive steps in strengthening its support for the Iraqi people and the government, the current government, in order to achieve their prosperity and stability. But Syria has been asking the Iraqis and the coalition leadership to assist Syria on their side of the borders to increase the soldiers and the monitoring of the borders. Syria itself with its capacity cannot do that alone and Syria also has been requesting some equipment, the night goggles.

What -- why is the United States so reluctant in trying to supply Syria with these goggles, even though they will have a big impact probably on guarding better, better guarding the borders?

GEN MYERS: If there has been a request for night-vision goggles, I'm not aware of that request. I'll have to plead ignorance on that one, if that's the case.

We do know and we give Syria credit for trying to work the border problem, but it's a huge problem and it's not worked very efficiently on the Syrian side. It's been a problem. It's a problem on the Iraqi side as well, and we've been, as people probably know, helping the Iraqis build border stations, putting in the information technology that enables them to check the authenticity of documents and so forth.

There's a bigger issue, though, that needs to be worked and that is, it is pretty well understood that a lot of the foreign fighters that come into Iraq come in through Syria and so they are getting some help in Syria, some facilitation to get them through Damascus and out to the border area. That is a problem that needs to be dealt with by Syria as well. And this is not to say the Syrian Government is sponsoring it, but in a society such as Syria, there's a good chance they know what's going on. So we need that help as well.

To align yourself with countries that are state sponsors of terrorism, to be in that camp, is not a very good place to be today because the world has figured that's not the way we want to live. And whether it involves the Middle East peace process and the militant groups that are involved in that, trying to disturb that process, that have headquarters in Damascus, that whether it's foreign fighters that are coming from many countries through Syria into Iraq, that's a very serious problem.

I would look at the NVG issue. I'm not -- something tickles me in the back of my mind, but it has not come to my attention.

MR. DENIG: Let's go to Russia, the middle of the front, right here.

QUESTION: Thank you. Dmitri Kirsanov for Russian News Agency TASS. Sir, I believe I have a sort of follow-up to the question that my colleague from Al-Jazeera asked you.

Probably, two weeks ago, two weeks or so ago, Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which is a regional alliance led by Russia and China, urged the United States to set up -- to set some timetable for American and coalition troops withdrawal from K2 and Ganci airbases in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, which you used to support Operation Enduring Freedom.

Spokesmen for both Defense and the State Department instantaneously rejected this goal. Is it because the situations in Afghanistan turned into a quagmire and you simply don't know when Operation Enduring Freedom will end up? Do you agree with the assessment of Shanghai Cooperation Organization that military face of the operation in Afghanistan is nearing the completion?

GEN MYERS: Well, that's a very broad question. Do I think Afghanistan is a quagmire? I just talked about Afghanistan. I think that 25 million citizens in Afghanistan, that are going to go to the polls in September, would tell you that no, Afghanistan is not a quagmire. I mean, the last person to use "quagmire" and Afghanistan in the same sentence was another reporter about a week before Kabul fell. This was within 30 days of U.S. forces arriving. So "quagmire" is overused, I think, a little bit.

Central Asia is important to the United States for lots of reasons, not just for operations in Afghanistan. It's important to us for lots of reason. Security and stability in Central Asia is an important concept, and those that can bring security and stability ought to be welcomed in Central Asia. Uzbekistan is a very important country over there. We are concerned with the 300 or so folks that were killed, citizens that were killed, during the rioting that went on there, not so long ago. But we still value and think it's important that we have some contact, military to military contact. One of the big problems that Uzbekistan faces is the threat of terrorism from the IMU and we can certainly help in that.

But, you know, the United States has friends and partners all around this world. We have no territorial designs as people, I think, well understand. So part of why we're there is, yes, we need some of the support for Afghanistan; some of why we're there is broader in terms of just normal relationships, the kind of relationships we have with Russia, the kind of exercises we do with your native country and with many other countries around the world. And so it's a much broader sort of issue than a narrow issue. And no, I don't think the Shanghai -- the memo or the communiqué or whatever came out -- was particularly useful. It looks to me like two very large countries were trying to bully some smaller countries. That's how I view it.

MR. DENIG: The gentleman in the striped shirt, please.

QUESTION: Thank you, General Myers. I am George Liu, Central News Agency of Taiwan.

General Myers, do you see the Chinese oil companies buying UNOCAL as a threat to U.S. national security? And are you concerned as a military chief over the rising of China? How do you evaluate the current cross-strait relations between Taiwan and China?

Thank you.

GEN MYERS: Well, I'll have to study the oil company issue more. I'm not prepared to talk about that today. But it's getting a lot of interest, of course, in Congress and at some point we probably will be asked our opinion. At that time, we'll provide it.

View on China. As you know, I've visited China, in January, I think, of 2004, and then I've hosted my counterpart here in the United States for a five- or six-day visit. Both very successful, both agreeing to more contact, military-to-military contact, to help with transparency and confidence building in our relationship. And that continues.

China is a growing economic power. They are modernizing their military, which, given their economic success, is not surprising. The PLA was not a particularly well equipped force previously, so they have upgraded their equipment. And I think that's a fair thing for a growing economic state to want to have a modern armed force.

I think our job is to continue to work the transparency and confidence-building measures that we can between each other and to develop along the lines of an increased security and stability in the region. That's what we want to do. So that's how I see China.

QUESTION: Aya Batrawy, Kuwait News Agency.

My first question is regarding Guantanamo Bay. Yesterday there was a hearing by the Senate Armed Forces Committee in which it was revealed that there was abusive and degrading treatment of prisoners, but the general in charge of Guantanamo Bay was not reprimanded because this was not against U.S. policy. So is that to say that degrading and abusive treatment of prisoners is U.S. policy?

And the second question is regarding Iraq. We were told before the January elections that violence would go up and afterwards that violence would go down, and now we're being told violence will go up and violence will go down. So what are you basing your assessment on? And if it's commanders on the ground in Iraq, I mean, clearly Douglas Feith this week said, you know, we made mistakes, he wound his way out. Yet Allawi said the Americans have no clear policy, no strategy in the U.S. after he left. So is there a miscommunication between what's happening in Iraq and the higher officials here in Washington at the Pentagon?

GEN MYERS: Well, that's a lot of questions. I may have to ask you to repeat part of that.

On the first part, our policy, that was -- you said -- I didn't write it down. You said that the general in charge was -- that this was somehow in accordance with policy. That's not at all what's involved here. It was very clear in the investigation that was briefed on the Hill yesterday and in a couple hearings that, in fact, there were some allegations -- this is all having to do with the FBI stories – and that there were non-allegations too which were proved not to even have existed. In the execution of authorized policy, some people went too far. They've already all been reprimanded in several different ways.

But it's all consistent with policy. The policy was to treat people humanely. And it also said that nobody was treated inhumanely. And, you know, it's a very difficult subject. Abuse is in the eyes of the beholder. Okay? Some people think that when we feed the detainees Meals Ready to Eat that that is abuse. In fact, some say torture. Abuse to feed them the same thing that our troops eat. Now, I can guarantee you we don't do that very often. You only do that when you have to do that. But we generally prefer that there are very good meals for the folks.

So it's a very difficult subject. You try to summarize it in way too simplistic of terms. I suggest you --

QUESTION: (Off mike.)

GEN MYERS: Yes, that's what the report said. Then you tied that and then you said -- and you misread it entirely -- that because, I think it was the CENTCOM commander didn't think we ought to reprimand the general in charge that we condone --

QUESTION: (Off mike.)

GEN MYERS: How is that? That doesn't connect.

QUESTION: (Off mike.)

GEN MYERS: No, that's not why we said it. You're misquoting that, then. It's not that he didn't (inaudible) the policy. It's that General Craddock didn't feel that he should be reprimanded for what took place at many levels below him. That's what was said. And there's a lot more that goes into that because the officer in question had done so much to correct the situation that he found in Guantanamo in the first place. And so there are lots of things that go into this, but I think your statement would be misleading.

And clearly, U.S. policy is very clear on this. We treat people humanely and in accordance with the Geneva Conventions as military necessity allows. You know, this is a problem and it's an international problem. It's not just one that occurs in the United States of America. We're on the forefront because we're the ones in Afghanistan and we rounded up lots of Taliban. You've got folks in al-Qaida and you've got folks that are very, very bad: Crimes against civilization. Crimes against humanity. They would kill your sister or brother or grandchild in a heartbeat. They don't care. They don't even know because it's random and indiscriminate. Those kind of people who have intelligence value, who, if let go, would perpetrate these acts.

And so how do you treat them? Do you put them in a civil court where perhaps a lot of very important and sensitive information would become known and help the adversary? Is that a good way to go? How do you treat them? It's a very difficult issue. The U.S. Government chose one path. But the path they chose always stated that we would treat them humanely. And when it's not done such, and there have been isolated cases where it has not been done. But according to our policy, people are held accountable. And who holds the U.S. military accountable? We hold ourselves. Who turned in the abuse at Abu Ghraib? It was a soldier. Okay? So we'll hold ourselves accountable as we learn about allegations. We've had over 60,000 detainees since 9/11/2001. 60,000. We've got about 400 allegations of some form of abuse. This has resulted in about a hundred of those allegations being proven: 60,000 detainees, about 400 allegations, 100 proven, more still being investigated. Some of them very serious. Some of them where detainees died. And then there's about 100-115 folks that have been held accountable, some of them serving very long sentences for the more serious cases.

So that's the status of the event. It's serious business. We take it very seriously. And I think we've promulgated a policy -- there is no policy of inhumane treatment in the case.

By the way, where they found where people went a little bit too far at Guantanamo in this last report, it was on two detainees. One of them was a fellow who was what we call the 20th hijacker. And so we knew he had knowledge of planning and war planning and we wanted to make sure that we understood what he knew. Having said that, you know, part of what they did was moderate his environment. You know, turned the air conditioner off. I mean, these are not good things, but I mean, that's what we get criticized for -- and we've taken steps to deal with people that do that, by the way. So there are some things they did. Shackling people to the floor for force protection was not authorized, using duct tape in some cases is not authorized. And people did it and they've been reprimanded. So we try to police ourselves, but it's a very serious question that deserves a very serious look by the international community on how to handle this. It's not clear cut. I think probably every country that's represented here, inside their own government, has struggled with this. How do you handle people and how do you preserve basic human rights, at the same time protect your population? It's not easy. It's much easier when it's nation-states that you're dealing with because we have a body of international law that tells us how we should behave. It's a lot different when you have individuals operating around the world that are perpetrating these crimes against civilization.

Now, you had a second part, Iraq and violence and --

QUESTION: (Off mike.)

GEN MYERS: Yeah, well, what we know is that in both Afghanistan and Iraq there are those that either don't want any progress, and that would be the folks associated with al-Qaida, because it's been said by many of the al-Qaida leaders, not the least of which is Zarqawi in Iraq, that a victory of Iraqi people in Iraq will be a real disaster for the cause. There is an Iraq, of course, that wants to return to the days of Saddam Hussein. So those groups will work very hard to frustrate the progress that's been made, and we know that and we can predict that. We are down to a level of incidents today that existed for much of 2004, well below the peak of where it was for elections, well below the peak where it was from elections. And of the 40 to 60 that happen every day, half of them have no effect. Others had the effect we saw yesterday where, of the 26 Iraqi civilians that were killed by suicide bombers, the majority of them were children. But that's going to be the pattern, and it's going to be political progress that will eventually be the success in Iraq.

MR. DENIG: Let's go to Serbia, the lady in black.

QUESTION: Dubravka Savic, Belgrade daily Vecernje Novosti. On the map of world transformation of U.S. military stationing in the world, what place do you see for Balkans? And more specifically, do you foresee any military bases of any kind in Serbia and Montenegro itself?

GEN MYERS: Well, the general issue -- and you're right -- is coming into this new century, the thought was that we ought to look around and see how we are postured in the world, around the world. And we've been doing that. We've been working with our friends and allies and others to determine how we ought to be postured. You've heard most of those moves. You know, we were very heavy in Central Europe in terms of U.S. force strength and, as you know, that's going to change and some of that force will be brought back to the United States. Some of it will be reallocated to other parts of Europe that might be closer to where you might have to respond. And when we talk about a military response, we shouldn't just think about force. It could be for humanitarian assistance or peacekeeping or whatever it might happen to be. That's point number one.

Point number two, I don't know of any plans right now in Serbia or Montenegro to look at stationing any U.S. forces there. You know, we are just beginning to work our relationship with Serbia and Montenegro. There are a few things that have to take place before it can become a more normal relationship, and one is the issue of the people that were indicted for war crimes that need to be turned over to The Hague. Once we get past that part, then I think anything is -- I'm not talking about now stationing of troops specifically -- but anything is possible after that. And certainly, we've been encouraging Serbia and Montenegro in many other ways.

MR. DENIG: One last quick single question. Front row, please.

QUESTION: Thank you. Petri Sarvamaa, Finnish Broadcasting.

Sir, you said that we are down to a level of incidents in Iraq that is lower than it was at certain times, perhaps the election and so on. To me, it seems that the undeniable, and not only to me but there was an article in The New York Times today quoting the Iraqi Ministry of Interior, giving out the numbers for the first time. And it's an undeniable fact that the death toll of Iraqi police and civilians is running high.

GEN. MYERS: That's correct.

QUESTION: It's definitely running higher than it was in 2003 and most part of 2004, if the Iraqi numbers are correct. My question is very clear and simple: Why is the American military not able to quell the insurgents in that country?

GENERAL MYERS: I think my answer will be clear and simple, too. The single greatest indigenous act of terror in the United States that I can recall was the bombing of the Murrah Building in Oklahoma City. How many people were involved? Two people. Killed 160 -- 168. Two people.

What if you had a country the size of Iraq, but you had not just two people but maybe 200, and maybe not 200 but 2,000, who, unlike the Murrah bombing, were willing to commit suicide in Iraq as well? This is a situation that the military can have an effect on, and I can guarantee you the coalition in there is having an effect. It would be worse, much worse, if the coalition forces weren't there, and if Iraqi forces weren't there to provide security.

But if you think back to the Murrah Building, two people that cobbled together their own explosives, their own conveyance and had that kind of effect, and you take it times 10 or times 100 or whatever you want to take it times, that's why I go back and why I responded to, I think, one of the previous questions: Success in Iraq will depend on two things. One is political progress. But political progress with all parts of the population feeling as if they have a stake in the new Iraq -- and support for these people will dry up. And that's how you win insurgencies. You don't win them just with military force.

The second thing it's going to take is a strong Iraqi security force with both police and border patrol and army. And that is, in fact, happening.

So you're right. They are picking on the soft and easy targets. That's what they do. They're not picking on the hard targets.

QUESTION: But, I mean, it's that much harder when there's no -- I mean, is there any end in sight?

GENERAL MYERS: I think, as I said, there is end in sight. And what you need to do is, if people are really interested, go back and read the histories of insurgencies. It's political progress that eventually ends the insurgency.

We have -- and the nature of this threat, I think, has to be taken into consideration. I put it in my opening comments and I think it accurately portrays what we're up against. We're up against people who are creating crimes against civilization, with no particular political goal for any particular country, other than their view of life. And there are not many people on this planet that can align with them.

I mean this is not -- this is certainly not about any particular religion. This is about violent extremism, crimes against civilization, crimes against humanity that would not fit in any of our religions. Whatever religion you profess, it would not fit in any one of those; they're outside of that. And they're willing to do anything.

And so as they get some support in some areas of Iraq -- in fact, as you know, there are only four provinces that are really an issue. As the people in those four provinces feel there is political progress being made and that they're part of it and they have a vote, I think we'll see that happen here. The constitution drafting process, as I understand it and has been briefed to me, is going very well. I don't know what briefings you're getting on it. I think we'll see the first draft here fairly quickly.

MR. DENIG: Thank you very much, General. Thank you ladies and gentlemen.

GENERAL MYERS: Thank you, all.

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