Bush meets with "former insurgents" who killed US soldiers; is "about to decide" Iraq's future

[Bluebear]

AL-ASAD AIR BASE, Iraq (AFP) — US President George W. Bush made a surprise visit to Iraq on Monday for "war-council" meetings with his top military advisers and Iraqi leaders to see if a US troop buildup is working.

Bush, on his first visit to Iraq since June 2006, was accompanied by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and met up with his Defence Secretary Robert Gates and top military commanders at the desert airbase of Al-Asad in the restive Anbar province west of Baghdad.

"This is the last big gathering of the president's military advisors and the Iraqi leadership before the president decides on the way forward," said Geoff Morrell, a Pentagon spokesman travelling with Gates.
"This is very much a decisional meeting. This meeting will put him much closer to a decision if he hasn't made one yet," he said...

Travelling to Al-Asad Air Base rather than Baghdad gave Bush an opportunity to highlight the dramatic shift in sentiment in Anbar, where former Sunni insurgents have joined with US forces to fight Al-Qaeda.

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jjKHiIyDQy3yJA74rByMd-fNzTRA

[pwb]

1. Our Jane Fonda president......

[TwilightGardener]

2. Prediction: Chimp announces surge worked in some areas, token withdrawal of troops

from those areas (Anbar) to placate war-weary Americans and boost troop morale, Dems in Congress will buy it, we'll still be there in 2009.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

3. All the Iraqis have to do is grow some and give their oil contracts to

France, Russia, Germany and others.... we'd be gone in a NY minute.

[blogslut]

4. Wasn't that what they were going to do before we invaded?

Correct me if I'm wrong. But as I recall, the U.N. sanctions were about to expire and Hussein was in talks with France, Germany and Russia to contract oil. And that may be one main reason why the US invaded, other than WMDS stop terrorism bring democracy whatever the reason?

[Disturbed]

5. Busholini doesn't meet up with that "good guy" Maliki?

I guess meeting with the PM of Iraq is not important when deciding what the plan for his country will be.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

7. Can't correct you on that sorry to say. n/t

[xchrom]

6. imagine the fear bush must have to live with meeting those guys.

when i think of his propensity -- his fetish -- his kink for killing people from afar -- imagine what kind of fear must be instilled in him to meet someone face to face who has killed.