Bush’s Secret Visit to Baghdad Illustrates U.S. Failure to Secure Iraq

“Seven months have passed since May 1 when President Bush, from the USS Abraham Lincoln, proudly announced the victory of the allied forces over Iraq and said now we are busy securing Iraq, so those announcements are now in contradiction with this secret night visit,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamidreza Asefi told reporters.

“Bush didn’t go there as a liberator. If Bush claimed that he was the liberator of Iraq he should have arranged a splendid visit and the Iraqi people greeted him,” Asefi said.

Asefi said the U.S. administration should be held accountable to its people about the fall of the U.S. foreign policy in the world.

“Thank you all very much. Admiral Kelly, Captain Card, officers and sailors of the USS Abraham Lincoln, my fellow Americans: major combat operations in Iraq have ended. In the battle of Iraq, the United States and our allies have prevailed. And now our coalition is engaged in securing and reconstructing that country,” remarked Bush on May 1 from the USS Abraham Lincoln at sea off the coast of San Diego, California.

“In this battle we have fought for the cause of liberty and for the peace of the world. Our nation and our coalition are proud of this accomplishment – yet it is you, the members of the United States military, who achieved it. Your courage, your willingness to face danger for your country and for each other made this day possible. Because of you, our nation is more secure. Because of you, the tyrant have fallen and Iraq is free,’ Bush further said on May 1.

Under the greatest secrecy Bush visited Baghdad on Thursday for a Thanksgiving dinner with 600 U.S. troops.

News of his trip was not even released until Air Force One had already left for fear of missile fire that forced an emergency landing by a DHL civilian cargo jet last week.

Accompanied by his national security advisor, Condoleeza Rice, Bush then met with administrator Paul Bremer and ground forces commander Lieutenant General Ricardo Sanchez, as well as four members of the U.S.-installed Iraqi Governing Council, before leaving after some two-and-a-half hours.

The White House planned a meticulous campaign to keep the first visit by a U.S. president to Iraq secret.

Television reports said U.S. authorities would have called it off had news been leaked in advance, and Air Force One landed at Baghdad airport without lights.

CNN said that even the president's father, ex-president George Bush was not told of the visit and his wife Laura was only informed at the last minute.

The ever-present threat from the insurgents, including a rocket attack on the Baghdad hotel where U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was staying a month ago, has forced all coalition leaders who come to Iraq to do so in the utmost secrecy.

A visit to Baghdad on Tuesday and Wednesday by British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw was only announced after he had completed his talks in the capital and was about to leave for the much calmer British-patrolled southern city of Basra.

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MNA