TIKRIT, September 2003 — If they had the chance, US soldiers at a base in Iraq would have had one question for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld — When are we going home?

But Rumsfeld canceled a speech he was due to give yesterday to the troops at their base at the palace of deposed Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in his hometown of Tikrit. “I don’t give a damn about Rumsfeld. All I give a damn about is going home,” Specialist Rue Gretton said, humping packs of water bottles on his shoulders from a truck.

“The only thing his visit meant for us was we had to clean up a lot of mess to make the place look pretty. And he didn’t even look at it anyway,” Gretton said after soldiers swept the dusty streets around the complex of lakes and mansions.

They also erected a stage and set out chairs for a speech that Rumsfeld cancelled due to a tight schedule. Instead, the Pentagon chief briefly thanked soldiers after a meeting with military leaders. “It was good for morale,” said Maj. Josslyn Alberle, a spokeswoman for the Fourth Infantry Division headquartered at the palace.

Sgt. Green, 40, did not think so. “If I got to talk to Rumsfeld I’d tell him to give us a return date. We’ve been here six months and the rumor is we’ll be here until at least March. This is totally, totally uncalled for,” she said.

Green, who asked not to be identified by her first name, complained she would miss seeing her 16-year-old through her whole school year.

Rumsfeld has been criticized for sending too few troops to Iraq leaving them stretched thin on extended deployments trying to help rebuild the country and fight a guerrilla war. He has urged allies to supply some 15,000 additional troops and hopes training Iraqi forces will ease the burden on US troops. When the Armed Forces Network showed earlier footage of Rumsfeld saying that fresh US troops were unnecessary in Iraq, soldiers at the base threw their hands in the air and shouted “No way” at the television. “I ain’t happy. No way am I happy seeing that,” said Specialist Devon Pierce, whose wife was due to give birth to his first son in two weeks. “This tour is hard, real hard. It’s too much. It should be six months.”

Other soldiers said they could not complain openly about their long deployment for fear of being disciplined.

Rumsfeld said yesterday the security situation had improved in Iraq since major combat was declared over on May 1, and the key to beefing up security forces was in training more Iraqis.

“There has been measurable progress,” Rumsfeld told reporters after meeting US administrator Paul Bremer and Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the top US military commander in Iraq. “It is getting better every day.”

Rumsfeld said Sanchez had not asked for additional US troops for Iraq. “If he wanted more troops, he would have them,” he said.

“It is understandable that with so much analysis and so much observation and so much scrutiny as to what’s going on here that the emphasis tends to be on the things that are unfortunate, where somebody is killed, or somebody is wounded, or some building is blown up, or someone is critical of the governing council or critical of the coalition, “ Rumsfeld said.

“It tends to create an impression, an imbalance in public perception that is unfortunate,” he added. Truck bomb attacks on the Jordanian Embassy and UN offices in Baghdad and almost daily attacks on US soldiers have led to concerns about the security situation.

Immediately after landing at Baghdad, Rumsfeld visited US soldiers at the airport, some of whom were wounded this week.

But he said the number of attacks had levelled off and there were signs of improvement. “It’s been fairly level in recent weeks.”

He said he did not know who was responsible for the truck bombs, but blamed the general violence on members of the now-banned Baath Party, foreign fighters, criminals and people doing it for money rather than ideology.