Rumsfeld not satisfied with Iraq

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Source: CCTV.com | 10-27-2006 09:35

Special Report:   Iraq in Transition

US Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld says the US will increase its support for Iraqi security forces. He also said trying to quell the violence there continued to be enormously challenging. Meanwhile, in Iraq, the US military increased its patrols and roadblocks in the search for a missing American soldier.

Rumsfeld said he has done a new assessment of the progress of the Iraqi forces, and he was not satisfied.

He said he intended to increase their budgets as well as their capabilities, and officials would work to help make the improvements more quickly.

The Defense Secretary told reporters that when the proposal came from Iraq for additional troops, they agreed.

Rumsfeld was under fire for his stewardship of the unpopular war in Iraq. He said people ought to back off and stop demanding specific benchmarks or timelines for progress in Iraq, saying it was just too difficult to predict when the Iraqis favored by the US could take control of their country.

Meanwhile in Iraq, American military spokesman Major General William Caldwell confirmed on Thursday that the US military was increasing its patrols and roadblocks in the search of a missing American soldier.

The US military said 96 US troops have died so far in October, the highest monthly total in a year. In total, the war in Iraq has claimed the lives of more than 2,800 US troops and untold numbers of Iraqis.

 

Editor:Sun Luying