Bush says Azzam death shows Iraq strategy working

By Tabassum Zakaria

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President George W. Bush cited on
Wednesday the killing of al Qaeda’s Abu Azzam as a sign that
the U.S. strategy in Iraq was defeating a violent insurgency,
although he warned there will be more violence before next
month’s vote on a new constitution.

Azzam, who was shot and killed in Baghdad, was “the
second-most wanted al Qaeda leader in Iraq,” and a top
lieutenant of insurgency leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Bush said
in his second speech in a week on fighting terrorism.

“This guy’s a brutal killer,” he said in the White House
Rose Garden, flanked by three generals, Defense Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney, who was using a
walking stick after recent aneurysm surgery behind both knees.

“He was reported to be the top operational commander of al
Qaeda in Baghdad. He is one of the terrorists responsible for
the recent upsurge in attacks in the Iraqi capital, which is
part of their campaign to stop a referendum on the Iraqi
constitution,” Bush said.

The president again warned that insurgents would escalate
violence in Iraq before an October 15 referendum on a new
constitution, and before elections in December. “As these
milestones approach we can expect there to be increasing
violence from the terrorists. They can’t stand elections,” he
said.

More than 1,900 U.S. troops have been killed in Iraq since
the U.S. invasion in March 2003, and the American public is
expressing growing uneasiness over the war in opinion polls.

A USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll published last week found 63
percent of respondents said some or all of the U.S. troops in
Iraq should be withdrawn, and a record-high 59 percent said the
invasion was a mistake.

Bush’s popularity rose after the September 11, 2001,
attacks, as he was seen as a strong leader in the fight against
terrorism.

CHANGING STRATEGIES

Bush said the U.S. military was changing its strategies and
tactics in Iraq to adapt to the changing operations of the
insurgency.

“Our strategy is clear in Iraq, we are hunting down high
value targets like Azzam and Zarqawi,” Bush said.

Iraqi forces are taking an increasing role in security
operations and holding control of cities where military
operations have flushed out insurgents, he said.

Recently in Tal Afar, Iraqi security forces outnumbered
coalition forces for the first time in a major operation, Bush
said.

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said the Bush
administration had failed to put forward a clear strategy for
success in Iraq.

“Our troops and the American people need the president to
pay more than just lip service to a strategy for the war in
Iraq, they need him to lay out what that strategy is with clear
markers by which success can be measured,” Reid said.

“The American people and Congress are growing increasingly
frustrated with the refusal of the Bush administration to come
clean and talk straight about the war in Iraq,” he said.

Azzam was tracked to a high-rise apartment building in
Baghdad where he was shot on Sunday. Al Qaeda in a statement on
an Islamist Web site, the authenticity of which could not be
verified, denied Azzam was Zarqawi’s deputy.

U.S. forces have been hunting for al Qaeda leader Osama bin
Laden for the September 11 attacks and Zarqawi for the Iraq
insurgency, but so far have not captured them.