Q How hard is it for you to conduct the war without popular support? Do you, personally -- do you ever have trouble balancing between doing what you think is the right thing and following the will of the majority of the public, which is really the essence of democracy?
BUSH: Yes, it is. And, first of all, I can fully understand why people are tired of the war. The question they have is, can we win it? And of course I'm concerned about whether or not the American people are in this fight. I believe, however, that when they really think about the consequences if we were to precipitously withdraw, they begin to say to themselves, maybe we ought to win this, maybe we ought to have a stable Iraq.
Their question, it seems like to me, is, can we succeed? And that's a very important, legitimate question for anybody to ask. I think many people understand we must succeed, and I think a lot of people understand we've got to wait for the generals to make these military decisions. I suspect -- I know this, Ed, that if our troops thought that I was taking a poll to decide how to conduct this war, they would be very concerned about the mission. In other words, if our troops said, well, here we are in combat, and we've got a Commander-in-Chief who is running a focus group -- in other words, politics is more important to him than our safety and/or our strategy -- that would dispirit our troops.
And there's a lot of constituencies in this fight -- clearly the American people, who are paying for this, is the major constituency. And I repeat to you, Ed, I understand that there -- this violence has affected them. And a lot of people don't think we can win. There's a lot of people in Congress who don't think we can win, as well, and therefore their attitude is, get out.
My concern with that strategy, something that Mike Hayden also discussed, is that just getting out may sound simple, and it may affect polls, but it would have long-term, serious security consequences for the United States. And so, Ed, sometimes you just have to make the decisions based upon what you think is right. My most important job is to help secure this country, and therefore, the decisions in Iraq are all aimed at helping do that job. And that's what I firmly believe.
A second constituency is the military. And I repeat to you, I'm pretty confident our military do not want their Commander-in-Chief making political decisions about their future.
A third constituency that matters to me a lot is military families. These are good folks who are making huge sacrifices, and they support their loved ones. And I don't think they want their Commander-in-Chief making decisions based upon popularity.
Another constituency group that is important for me to talk to is the Iraqis. Obviously, I want the Iraqi government to understand that we expect there to be reconciliation top down; that we want to see laws passed. I think they've got that message. They know full well that the American government and the American people expect to see tangible evidence of working together; that's what the benchmarks are aimed to do.
But they also need to know that I am making decisions based upon our security interests, of course, but also helping them succeed, and that a poll is not going to determine the course of action by the United States. What will determine the course of actions is, will the decisions that we have made help secure our country for the long run?
And, finally, another constituency is the enemy, who are wondering whether or not America has got the resolve and the determination to stay after them. And so that's what I think about, Ed.
You know, I guess I'm like any other political figure -- everybody wants to be loved, just sometimes the decisions you make and the consequences don't enable you to be loved. And so when it's all said and done, Ed, if you ever come down and visit the old, tired, me down there in Crawford, I will be able to say I looked in the mirror and made decisions based upon principle, not based upon politics. And that's important to me.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/07/20070712-5.html
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