BABYLON, 7 September 2003 — More British troop reinforcements were on their way to Iraq yesterday as US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld pressed his inspection of the war-torn country and US officials planned to bolster Iraqi security forces to stem rising violence.
And as Washington labored to nail down a UN resolution authorizing an expanded international force, President George W. Bush was preparing a major weekend address on Iraq.
“The president felt this was a good time to talk to the American people about our progress and our needs moving forward,” said White House spokesman Scott McClellan. But the president was not expected to announce any major new initiatives.
An additional 120 British troops were due to arrive in Iraq from their rear base in Cyprus last night, bringing British troops numbers in Iraq to a total of 10,620.
“They are going to be reinforcing the multinational force in the southeast based in Basra and they are going to be involved in a variety of tasks, all of them related to security,” British military spokesman Major Niall Greenwood said.
Rumsfeld flew by helicopter to the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon to meet with officers and troops of the 21-nation division holding down a large chunk of south-central Iraq under Polish command.
“This is a major accomplishment,” said Rumsfeld, wearing blue blazer and tie in the searing heat on the third day of his unannounced trip to the country where some US 130,000 troops are deployed.
Rumsfeld defended the work of the occupation troops. “This work will be difficult but a wonderful start has been made,” he said. “The political leadership is in place and assuming more and more responsibility ... (but) the economic circumstance has to improve still more. The security situation, we all recognize, is a difficult one in the sense there are terrorists, there are former regime Baathists, there are criminals and there are people willing to kill innocent men, women and children.”
Maj. Gen. Andrzej Tyszkiewicz, the Polish officer commanding the 9,000-strong contingent also said it faced major challenges but added: “We must succeed. There is no other way.” The biggest task, the general said, was welding soldiers from 21 nations together into a fighting force. Washington has encountered more of a political backlash in its bid to bring in more foreign troops to add to the 10,620 Britons and 16,000 committed by 32 other countries.
UN delegates said that a meeting of the 15 Security Council members on Friday was constructive but divisions remained over the extent of the United Nation’s role in Iraq. A timetable restoring full Iraqi sovereignty was another sticking point in the US draft that seeks multinational troops, more finances for reconstruction work and acceptance of the US-installed Iraqi governing council.
