White House moves to seize opportunity

WASHINGTON – The killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi opened an opportunity Thursday for the White House to show that its military mission can still prevail in Iraq, and administration officials moved quickly to try to seize the diplomatic and political initiative.

In an early-morning appearance in the Rose Garden to hail al-Zarqawi’s death, President Bush announced that he was summoning his top advisers to an unusual meeting at Camp David on Monday and Tuesday to chart a way forward in Iraq, with the focus on how to deploy American resources to bolster the fledgling government. Troop reductions are not on the agenda, the White House press secretary said.

Administration officials said a range of issues will be on the table, including developing a new security plan for violence-ridden Baghdad, spurring reconciliation between warring Sunni and Shiite populations and the possibility of new international economic assistance for Iraq.

White House officials were clearly elated by the good news from Iraq. With support for Bush on Iraq at a low ebb, the day’s developments seemed to present a chance to change the story line, bolster public support at home and have a strong launch for Iraq’s new government.

Like the capture of Saddam Hussein, al-Zarqawi’s death is likely to give the president a boost in the opinion polls, at least temporarily. He dearly needs it, with approval of his handling of Iraq dipping to 33 percent, a new low, and his overall job approval at 35 percent in a new AP-Ipsos poll.

The poll, taken Monday through Wednesday, before al-Zarqawi’s death, found that 59 percent of adults said the United States made a mistake in going to war in Iraq – the highest level yet in AP-Ipsos polling.

The Iraq enterprise is now largely in the hands of untested political leaders in Iraq, and administration officials believe that a successful start – after six months of bickering and rising violence after December elections – is their last reasonable chance to steady the country for the foreseeable future.

“There’s going to be a window of opportunity for this new government to sink or swim,” said White House counselor Dan Bartlett.

While Bartlett offered no specific window, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, put the time frame at six months in an interview this week with Der Spiegel, a German magazine. “The next six months will be critical in terms of reining in the danger of civil war,” Khalilzad said.