Bush war policy needs more time, says Rice [View All]

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Source: CNN/AP

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice exhorted congressional critics of Iraq war policy Friday to give the Bush administration and the fledgling government in Baghdad until September to "make a coherent judgment of where we are."

On the morning after the House voted 223-201 for a Democratic proposal to force a U.S. troop withdrawal by next spring, Rice acknowledged in a round of television interviews that Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's government hasn't achieved "as much progress as we would like."

"But we shouldn't just dismiss as inconsequential the progress that they have made," the secretary argued.

Maj. Gen. Benjamin R. Mixon, a top U.S. commander in Iraq, told Pentagon reporters via a video linkup from Iraq that "there will be consequences" if U.S. troops are withdrawn too soon.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/07/13/us.iraq.ap/index.html

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