WASHINGTON, 29 November 2003 — US President George W. Bush’s surprise visit to Baghdad was the main course in US newspapers’ post-Thanksgiving issues yesterday, but the dailies diverged in their assessments of the trip’s outcome.
The Washington Post noted that while troops from the 1st Armored Division “cheered the moment, it is too soon to know whether the image of Bush in his army jacket yesterday will become a symbol of strong leadership or a symbol of unwarranted bravado.”
“Iraqis may be reassured that the United States will put down the insurgency and restore order in their country,” the Post said in an analysis. “Or they may take the image of Bush landing unannounced at night without lights and not venturing from a heavily fortified military installation as confirmation that the security situation in Iraq is dire, indeed.”
Bush’s national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, denied that the secrecy and security surrounding Bush’s trip showed that the US has made no progress in Iraq.
Appearing on ABC and other major US television networks yesterday, she said “it’s just not true that nothing has changed” during the eight-month US-led occupation.
“The Iraqis are taking control of their own future. Most of the country remains quite stable. The Iraqis are planning and looking forward to the transfer of sovereignty. They’re taking over ministries, schools are opening, all of those things are happening,” she told ABC just hours after returning with Bush from his surprise Thanksgiving holiday visit.
“Obviously, Iraq is still a dangerous place, and that’s no secret to anyone.”
The White House demanded absolute secrecy from reporters traveling with Bush until his Air Force One plane had left the Iraqi capital after just two and a half hours, and the president never left the heavily guarded airport there.
The presidential plane made a special landing designed to limit its exposure to surface-to-air missiles, and arrived with its running lights turned off and all shades drawn to prevent light from seeping out and giving away its position.
Rice said Bush’s visit was designed to boost eroding US troop morale and let Iraqis know that the United States will stay until the war-ravaged country is stable and on the road to democracy and prosperity.
Most US newspapers splashed large photos of Bush — holding a serving platter with a Thanksgiving turkey and trimmings — across the front page. They also described in detail the measures the White House took to keep the trip cloaked in the shroud of secrecy required for the president’s safe passage to and from Baghdad, but the subject was notably absent from editorial pages.
The Los Angeles Times, for its part, declared in an analysis piece that “with his dramatic visit to Baghdad, President Bush has demonstrated again the depth of his commitment to the military mission that could decide his fate in the 2004 election.”
It said the “underlying message of Bush’s trip seems more likely to harden than rearrange the increasingly polarized lines of domestic debate over the struggle to reconstruct Iraq.”
But the daily added that, for supporters and opponents alike, “the trip was emblematic of Bush’s approach to politics. From his repeated tax cuts... to his attempt to reorient US national security policy around his vision of pre-emptive defense, Bush has consistently set out large goals — and then pursued them tenaciously, even at the price of sharply dividing opinion at home and around the world.
“When challenged, he usually digs in deeper, and that may be precisely what he intended to convey with his visit” to Baghdad on Thursday, the Times said.
