Barbara Ferguson, Arab News

NEW YORK, 26 May 2004 — President Bush sought to reassure Americans, Iraqis and the world Monday night that he has a plan to help Iraq achieve stable self-rule and hold national elections as early as next January.

His speech was an obvious attempt to revive support for the occupation in Iraq and was almost immediately greeted with dismay by Iraqis and skepticism by the big powers.

Bush outlined his strategy for promoting freedom and a democratic government, including plans to demolish the infamous Abu Ghraib prison.

After weeks of troubling setbacks in Iraq — several polls show the worst approval ratings of his term — the speech was an effort to quash concerns that the administration is acting without a concrete plan and intends to keep the US military there indefinitely.

His speech added almost nothing new to the existing Iraq plan, but Bush promised the US will deliver “full sovereignty” to the transitional government scheduled to take control on June 30.

Bush declined to name the Iraqis who will take power or to clearly define the future US military presence in Iraq. Instead, he used the speech to draw public attention to elements of the transition that are already known, and repackaged the US policy as a five-step plan.

“America’s task in Iraq is not only to defeat an enemy, it is to give strength to a friend — a free, representative government that serves its people and fights on their behalf,” Bush said in his 33-minute speech at the Army War College. “And the sooner this goal is achieved, the sooner our job will be done.”

Bush also acknowledged there had been “failures” in the early military plans, but said they were unintended consequences of having disassembled Saddam Hussein’s regime faster than expected.

“We’ve taken steps to correct them,” he said of military missteps that allowed the former Iraqi Army to fade back into the civilian population before its troops could be detained.

Speaking on behalf of Iraq’s interim Governing Council, the current president, Ghazi Al-Yawar, told reporters in Baghdad that “while it was very positive, in many regards it fell short of our expectations.”

Yawar said the council’s two main concerns were that the interim government must have the power to ask foreign troops to leave Iraq and that it exercise full control over funds to reconstruct the war-torn country.

Council spokesman Hamid Al-Kifaey said the interim leadership would oppose any attempt that restricts its sovereignty.

At the United Nations, the United States faced misgivings from other Security Council members about plans to hand over sovereignty.

France, Germany, Russia and China signaled they wanted changes to a US-British drafted resolution on Iraq’s transition.

The resolution presented to the Security Council members on Monday is an integral part of Bush’s plan for stabilizing Iraq and creating a democratic state.

It would endorse the formation of a sovereign interim Iraqi government but allow US-led forces to take “all necessary measures” to keep the peace and fight terrorism.

Several council members said they expected the resolution on Iraq’s transition to be adopted with some changes before June 30.

Some nations want an expiration date to be set for the multinational force and then the right to renew the force if the Iraqis agree, their envoys said.

The draft now calls for a review in a year, which means the mandate of the force is open-ended unless the council adopts another resolution to withdraw the foreign troops.

Iraq’s defense minister, however, raised the prospect of a far swifter exit for foreign forces, saying they could be out of the country in months rather than years.

Ali Allawi told reporters in London Iraq could quickly reassemble a security force from the remnants of Saddam Hussein’s defeated army, which was dissolved on US orders, and assume primary control over security before January elections.

“In terms of the timeline for the presence of multinational forces to help us establish security and stability, I think it will be a question of months rather than years,” Allawi said.

Going into operational specifics of the occupation forces in the run-up to the elections, British Prime Minister Tony Blair said Iraqis would have to consent to a major US-led military operation and that this would be spelled out in an exchange of letters that will be attached to the UN resolution.