President: U.S. will persist in ‘struggle of ideology’

FORT LEWIS, Wash. – In an interview Friday, President Bush warned that Afghanistan and Iraq are but two battles in the larger international war on terrorism.

He said he’s confident that Americans have the resolve to press ahead.

“They haven’t forgotten Sept. 11,” he said. “Look, they don’t like the prison scenes on TV. They don’t like the fact that young soldiers are dying. But when reminded of the stakes, they understand.

“We’re in a war,” he said. “People say, ‘Maybe it’s just a simple skirmish.’ No, this is a struggle of ideology and political vision.”

In the interview with The Spokesman-Review and two Seattle newspapers, with question topics limited to Iraq and the economy, Bush described his vision for the Middle East and outlined his rationale for believing that Saddam Hussein was a threat.

“He was a threat because he hated America, for starters, and he provided a safe haven for terrorists,” Bush said.

Intelligence reports at the time “made it very clear that he had weapons of mass destruction,” Bush said. “And every nation in the world thought he had weapons of mass destruction.”

The reports were apparently wrong. No stockpiles of chemical, nuclear or biological weapons have been found in Iraq.

“He had the capability of making weapons” of mass destruction, Bush said. “He had used weapons. And so I had a decision … trust the guy or defend? I chose to defend.”

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who was traveling with Bush on Friday, agreed.

“Yes, there was a problem with the intelligence regarding weapons of mass destruction,” he said. “But that doesn’t change the fact that Saddam Hussein used the weapons, wanted to use the weapons, had the capability to produce those weapons again. Everybody knows if he had the chance, he would do it in a New York minute.”

Bush said he’s encouraged that Iraqis are stepping forward to take over their country’s government and some security operations.

“As we look back, maybe we could’ve done a quicker job of standing them (Iraqi security forces) up, ready to fight,” he said. “Because the truth of the matter is they want to fight for themselves. They don’t want to fight for Americans.”

Similarly, Iraqis are far more likely to rally behind new Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi than around occupation officials, the president said. At the end of the month, occupation forces will transfer sovereignty to Iraqis, although U.S. troops will remain there for some time.

Bush said he wants Iraq to serve as a beacon of freedom in the Middle East in the way West Germany was a bulwark against communism during the Cold War.

“The best way to defeat terror in the long run is to listen to the hopes and aspirations of people,” he said. “People turn hateful or frustrated because they don’t have any hope. Hopeless people become susceptible to recruitment by haters.”

If America doesn’t deal with the problems in the Middle East that give rise to terrorism, he said, future generations of Americans will suffer the consequences. Bush sees hope in the democratization of Turkey, and he envisions growing democracy in Lebanon, a Palestinian state and elsewhere in the region.

Iraq’s post-Saddam fate, he said, rests in the hands of Iraqis.

“They can’t rely on America or (American civilian administrator Paul) Bremer to make every decision for them. There’s a certain sense of responsibility that comes in a free society,” he said. “That is being honored. To me, history will record this as the turning point for the emergence of a free Iraq.”