The top American commander in Baghdad said Thursday that al Qaeda’s No. 1 goal is defeating the United States in Iraq. Army Gen. David Petraeus acknowledged that al Qaeda’s string of suicide bombings have inflicted “significant blows” to the Bush administration’s two-month-old troop surge designed to secure the capital.
“Iraq is, in fact, the central front of al Qaeda’s global campaign, and we devote considerable resources to fight against al Qaeda in Iraq,” Petraeus said at the Pentagon, a day after delivering sober closed-door briefings on Capitol Hill. “It is a very significant enemy. I think it is probably public enemy No. 1.”
Since the reinforcement began in February to secure Baghdad, al Qaeda in Iraq, a franchise of Osama bin Laden’s global network, has unleashed suicide bombers at an increased pace, killing hundreds of Iraqis.
The increase comes despite a three-year U.S. effort to stop the flow of these foreign jihadists from Syria and to dismantle bomb-making shops.
“Al Qaeda, Iraq, remains a formidable foe with considerable resilience and a capability to produce horrific attacks.” Petraeus said. “But a group whose ideology and methods have increasingly alienated many in Iraq.”
Petraeus, a counterinsurgency specialist who took command in Iraq as the surge of nearly 30,000 additional American troops began, made no claim to any great success in the first two months.
“We are seeing a revival of markets, renewed commerce, the return of some displaced families and the slow resumption of services, though I want to be very clear that there is vastly more work to be done across the board,” he said.
Of the overall mission of securing the country and achieving political reconciliation between Sunni and Shiite Muslims, the four-star general said, “The operational environment in Iraq is the most complex and challenging I have ever seen.”
He indicated that little progress has been made in two years. He said the battlefield is “much more complex than it was when I left” in September 2005 after completing a tour as chief of Iraqi security force training.
“This effort may get harder before it gets easier,” Petraeus said.
