Bush says to send more troops to Iraq

U.S. President George W. Bush said Wednesday night that he has ordered more than 20,000 additional American troops to Iraq, as part of his new Iraq strategy.

In a prime-time televised speech, Bush said past U.S. efforts to secure the Iraqi capital of Baghdad failed for two major reasons: not enough Iraqi and American troops to secure neighborhoods cleared of terrorists and insurgents, and too many restrictions on U.S. troops deployed in the war-torn country.

The United States would change its strategy to help the Iraqis carry out their campaign to put down sectarian violence and bring security to the people of Baghdad, and that would require increasing American force levels, he said.

The vast majority of the additional troops -- five brigades -- would be deployed to Baghdad, and some 4,000 others would be sent to Iraq's western Anbar Province, said Bush.

U.S. troops would have a well-defined mission -- to help Iraqis clear and secure neighborhoods, to help them protect the local population, and to help ensure that the Iraqi forces left behind were capable of providing the security that Baghdad needed, he said.

The president said the Iraqi government plans to take responsibility for security across the country by November so as to "establish its authority."

Iraq would pass legislation to share oil revenues among all Iraqis, and the Iraqi government would spend 10 billion U.S. dollars of its own money on reconstruction and infrastructure projects that would create new jobs, he said.

Bush said that Iraq plans to hold provincial elections later this year, and the Iraqi government would reform de-Baathification laws and establish a fair process for considering amendments to Iraq's constitution, to allow more Iraqis to re-enter their nation's political life.

The U.S. government would change its approach to help the Iraqi government as it worked to meet these benchmarks, he said.

Bush noted the United States would increase the embedding of American advisers in Iraqi Army units and partner a coalition brigade with every Iraqi Army division, one of the many recommendations by the Iraq Study Group that reviewed the administration's Iraq policy.

The Untied States would help the Iraqis build a larger and better-equipped Army, and accelerate the training of Iraqi forces, which remained the essential U.S. security mission in Iraq, he said.

Source: Xinhua