15 April 2003
Two Carrier Battle Groups Headed Home from Iraq
(Major hostilities in Iraq ended, but small pockets of resistance remain) (6310) Air Force General Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, says U.S. carrier battle groups and combat aircraft are starting to return home from Iraq and "we have begun transitioning from combat operations to working with local Iraqis to stabilize and secure Iraq's cities and towns." "Two aircraft carrier battle groups, the U.S.S. Kitty Hawk and U.S.S. Constellation, will begin sailing back to their homeports in the next couple of days", Myers said. "Air Force combat aircraft like the B-2 Stealth bomber and the F-117 Stealth fighters and other aircraft are returning home as well", he added. Briefing reporters at the Foreign Press Center in Washington April 15, Myers said that although the major combat in Iraq is over, some pockets of resistance remain and must be dealt with, including four to five dangerous sectors in Baghdad that are not yet secure. He also said that a concerted effort is under way to unearth the former regime's weapons of mass destruction. Myers said Turkey's role in peacekeeping in northern Iraq is yet to be determined, but he added that both the United States and Turkey had a presence in northern Iraq before the war began and have been maintaining contact with the Kurdish population there. "The Turkish forces inside Northern Iraq right now that are with U.S. forces are there specifically to keep the Turkish General Staff and the Turkish politicians informed on exactly what is happening," he said. Myers said that humanitarian aid remains a critical part of the coalition's mission and that the coalition partners will fully support the Iraqi people, who "have a unique opportunity to now shape a representative government." (begin transcript) FOREIGN PRESS CENTER BRIEFING GENERAL RICHARD B. MEYERS, CHAIRMAN OF THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF TOPIC: ISSUES RELATING TO IRAQ THE WASHINGTON FOREIGN PRESS CENTER WASHINGTON, D.C. TUESDAY, APRIL 15, 2003 MR. DENIG: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Foreign Press Center. A warm welcome, also, to journalists at the New York Foreign Press Center. We are delighted to have you here today for the second in our series of briefings for journalists from Arab and Muslim countries. And for our host this morning I will introduce Ambassador Christopher Ross, a Middle East expert from the Department of State and the Deputy to the Under Secretary of State for Public Affairs and Public Diplomacy. Ambassador Ross. AMBASSADOR ROSS: Thank you, Paul. (Ambassador Ross addresses journalists in Arabic and French). And for those of you who speak English, good morning, and welcome. As you know, we have tried to organize some special events for journalists from the Arab and Muslim countries. Last week we had the honor and privilege of being with Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz [and General Peter Pace]. And today, we have a special treat in the presence of General Richard B. Myers, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who serves as the principal military advisor to the President, to the Secretary of Defense and to the National Security Council. General Myers has had a long and distinguished career that spans almost 40 years. You have the details available to you. So without further ado, let me introduce and ask General Myers to come to the podium. GENERAL MYERS: Thank you, Ambassador Ross, and good morning, everybody. In little more than three weeks, the Saddam Hussein regime has fallen and the process of returning Iraq to the Iraqi people has begun. Oil wells have been secured for the Iraqi people, which they will need to develop for their country after decades of neglect by the Iraqi regime. While major combat operations are over, coalition forces continue to encounter pockets of resistance throughout Iraq. So there is more to do. We must eliminate the Iraqis' weapons of mass destruction; we must expand humanitarian relief, food and medicine, to the Iraqi people; and we must help the Iraqi people create the conditions for a rapid transition to a representative self-government that is not a threat to its neighbors and is committed to ensuring the territorial integrity of that country. The United States is beginning to send military forces home. Two aircraft carrier battle groups, the U.S.S. Kittyhawk and U.S.S. Constellation, will begin sailing back to their homeports in the next couple of days. Air Force combat aircraft like the B-2 Stealth bomber and the F-117 Stealth fighters and other aircraft are returning home, as well. We have begun transitioning from combat operations to working with local Iraqis to stabilize and secure Iraq's cities and towns. But from the beginning we have made humanitarian assistance to the Iraqi people a critical part of our mission -- food, water, and medical supplies are flowing from the United States, from Kuwait, Australia, Spain, Qatar, and many other coalition partners, including an advance party from Jordan to set up a field hospital in Baghdad. Water and electrical services are being restored in city after city throughout Iraq, and the coalition partners will support the Iraqi people as they rebuild their nation. The people of Iraq have a unique opportunity to now shape a representative government. That first meeting, of course, as you are well aware, is -- was today. With that, I think I'll take your questions and we'll turn to New York first. I understand we may have some media there at the Foreign Press Center in New York. So New York, if you're there, we'll take the first question, first couple of questions, from New York. We won't give them very long, either. New York, are you there? Can you answer a question? Can you ask a question? (No response.) Okay. While they're trying to figure that out, we'll go here. Okay. (Laughter.) QUESTION: Said Arikat, Al Quds. General Myers, do you have an estimate, sir on the number of Iraqis that were injured by the military? And second to that, did the U.S. have to use extra special, you know, weapons towards the end of the campaign? AMBASSADOR ROSS: That last question was, did they use -- QUESTION: Conventional arms. Non-conventional, but not for the short distance, but for the -- GENERAL MYERS: Oh, did the U.S.? Well, I can answer that question right away. No, there was no change in the weapons used throughout the conflict. So the same weapons that were used at the beginning were used at the end. There were no special weapons of any sort used towards the end of the campaign. In terms of numbers, I don't know that we'll ever know for sure how many Iraqi civilians were injured, either by the coalition or by the Iraqi regime, during this conflict. I think it will probably be near impossible to tell. We should have -- as time goes on, you'll probably get better and better estimates, but they'll probably always remain just that. And in terms of Iraqi military casualties, I've not seen any numbers on that. I don't know that we know that, either. It's, again, hard to tell. In engagement after engagement, there would be some Iraqi military killed, there would be some obviously wounded -- some of whom we're treating by the way in U.S. hospitals and on our hospital ship, The Mercy -- and then some that just walked off the battlefield and you don't know where they went or what their condition was. So it's going to be probably impossible to know. Yes, ma'am. QUESTION: Amal Chmouny from Al-Hayal Newspaper. General, can you please highlight for us the sites of the war that we didn't get the opportunity to see from the embedded journalists or from the journalists who were in Iraq? They were, like, Special Forces that were, you know -- and the other day, Iraq was -- I mean, Baghdad is not any more fighting and things happened. Can you please? GENERAL MYERS: Well, I'll try. There was extensive use of Special Forces throughout the country, but let's take the north for starters. As you know, we did not have a large U.S. force, as we had originally planned, into the north. But what we did have were Special Forces and we had over 50 teams of Special Forces, small teams, that went into Northern Iraq to help give confidence to the Kurdish population up there that if they were to be attacked by Iraqi military forces, that they could be protected, and they'd be protected by these small teams connecting to U.S. air power. And, in fact, that was done for some time. And I think the lack of refugees and internally displaced people in Northern Iraq is probably testament to the fact that they did feel secure up there. That was one use. Another use was in Western Iraq where we were trying to find any indications and locations of potential launch areas and launch equipment and missiles that could be sent towards Syria, Jordan or Israel, as happened in the Gulf War back in '91. And so they -- U.S. Special Forces, UK Special Forces, Australian Special Forces -- were used in Western Iraq quite extensively to try to find those launch sites and prohibit missile launches that could reach other countries. And then throughout the country, Special Forces were used, in many cases, to provide good intelligence to our conventional forces. So they worked very closely throughout the country. Now, you know, our Special Forces are also the ones that understand, probably have been trained the best to understand, the cultural sensitivities and other issues, and so they are often the ones that work with local leadership to help bring back police forces, local government, and those sorts of things. So they can transition very quickly from special operations, where you think about maybe combat, to special operations where they are working the humanitarian assistance and help the Iraqi people rebuild their infrastructure, their civil political infrastructure. Yes, sir. QUESTION: This is Umit Enginsoy with NTV, Turkish Television. General, if today you receive an order from President Bush to launch some kind of military action against Syria, would the U.S. military forces be altogether ready to fulfill that responsibility? And secondly, in Northern Iraq, especially in Mosul and Kirkuk, there are reports of continuing ethnic violence, and especially some Turkomen complaining that there is continuing pressure on them. Could you elaborate on the situation there? Thank you. GENERAL MYERS: On the first part of the question, that's such a hypothetical situation, and I am not going to answer the question. I would only answer it by saying that U.S. Forces are always ready to carry out orders we get from our President. On the second part, in terms of the situation in Northern Iraq, a report I got today was that in Kirkuk, one of the major cities up in Northern Iraq, that the situation was calm. We should have -- and we have had, I think, for several days -- Turkish military liaison officers with the U.S. Forces that are inside Kirkuk. And so reports on inter-ethnic violence and so forth should be able to be confirmed or denied based on observation of people from Turkey who are there watching what's happening in close coordination with U.S. Forces. Clearly, our intention is that the coalition force is to prevent any inter-ethnic fighting and we'll continue to do that. And, as I said before, the Turkish forces will be part of that. In Mosul, the same thing applies. The situation is not quite as calm there as it is in Kirkuk; but, again, we have U.S. Forces there. We also have Turkish liaison elements there, as well, so whatever the situation is, it will be transparent to both the Government of Turkey and coalition forces. And we will continue to do that because, as I said before, our objective is to not have inter-ethnic fighting and to give the people of Northern Iraq confidence that they won't be -- no matter who they are, no matter what faction they belong to, Turkoman, Kurds, whomever -- that they won't be brought under undue pressure from other groups. And so we'll continue to work them. Yes, ma'am. QUESTION: My name is Yasemin Congar. I am with Turkey's Milliyet newspaper and CNN Turk. General, also on Northern Iraq, General Franks, on Sunday, talking on the Sunday talk shows said that the U.S.'s inability to introduce larger number of troops into Northern Iraq actually enabled the introduction of new variables to the theater. So he looked at it as a positive thing after all. In hindsight, what would you say there have been -- some of the minuses and plusses of the situation because of Turkey's reluctance to let the U.S. troops go into Northern Iraq? GENERAL MYERS: Well, unfortunately, I did not hear General Franks' comments, so I can't reference those. I think in the end in Northern Iraq we didn't have, as I said earlier, we did not have the big refugee flow, not a lot of internally displaced people. I think that was because the U.S. very quickly put in these Special Forces teams in the north to help work that issue. Those are the same teams that are now in Kirkuk and Mosul that are helping to maintain stability there. You never know how it might have gone or how close we came. Of course, the northern oil fields are now under control, as well, and including a lot of the gas/oil separators, one of the refineries. I think most of the oil apparatus in the country is pretty much under control, so elements of the regime that might be intent on destroying that infrastructure -- it probably can't happen now, so that also was good news. I don't know how to line up the plusses and minuses very well. Clearly, our first preference was to have U.S. ground forces come into Northern Iraq through Turkey. Having said that, we did get overflight of Turkey for our forces, and that was very, very helpful. That's what enabled us to get those Special Forces teams in. We also had other sorties flying over Iraq, re-supply sorties and combat sorties. That was all -- and the Tomahawk Land Attack Cruise Missile -- those were all very helpful things. How you add up the plusses and minuses in the end, I'll leave that to the historians, I think. Yes, ma'am. QUESTION: Reha Atasagan with the Public TRT, Public Television, Turkey. Sir, General Myers, you said, actually, yesterday Defense Minister Rumsfeld said that things are happening, looting, and it happens during wartime. But in Northern Iraq, it's a rather complex situation because there's an ongoing multi-ethnic conflict over there and there are so many issues there. How long with the American military presence will continue there? And also, the military -- is the American military is cooperating with one of the parties there? The Kurds, in general terms, except you forced the Peshmergas out of Mosul and Kirkuk, but you are cooperating with one of the parties over there, and how long will this go on? GENERAL MYERS: How long coalition forces will be in Iraq, I think President Bush said it well, "We're going to be there as long as required, and not one day longer." So this is not something where we want to be in Iraq for a long time. What we want is for some Iraqi Government to form and stand up that is dedicated to preserving the territorial integrity of Iraq; that is dedicated to some representative form of government where all entities in Iraq, be they minorities or majorities, are represented in such a way that they can't be abused by a government; and an Iraq that is not a danger to its neighbors and that does not have weapons of mass destruction. So those are the basic goals. And all our intent is to assist in the humanitarian work that needs to be done, to assist in helping the Iraqi people to help them rebuild their government again. Like I said, one of those meetings is today. In terms of the United States and in Northern Iraq, clearly, before this war began, both Turkey and the United States had a presence in Northern Iraq and contact with the Kurdish population there. But that in no way should be seen as favoritism to one group or another. This is up to Iraqis to figure this out. This is not up to the U.S. to support one faction or another faction. And we will not do that. We will work very, very hard to let this be an Iraqi issue. Iraq has to figure out how to govern itself in the future. This is not something we can dictate, I don't think, from the United States. It's getting a little bit outside my portfolio now. But that's an issue for the Iraqi people, and we will try to maintain as even a hand as we possibly can in that. QUESTION: General, how many troops -- MR. DENIG: Introduce yourself, please. QUESTION: Dana Budeiri, Al-Jazeera. General, how many troops do you estimate will be needed for stability inside Iraq from now on? Do you think, like the Shinseki estimate was a good one? More than that? Smaller than that? GENERAL MYERS: I'm not going to estimate right now. I will say this, though. We currently have, I think, about 120,000 or so U.S. troops in Northern Iraq -- or in Iraq in general, and if my memory serves me right, around 20-30,000 troops of coalition partners. The situation is such -- that's one fact. The situation changes almost daily. If you look at Basra over the last several weeks where you had a lot of paramilitary operating and today you don't have much paramilitary operating, where you have the beginnings of civil governance in Basra, where you have a police force being formed -- by the Iraqis with some assistance -- to prevent the looting and bring law and order back to Basra, that has changed very rapidly. My suspicions are that that will continue to change over time very quickly. What we're doing right now and what General Franks is doing is to try to estimate the number of forces that need to stay to provide basic security, to hunt for weapons of mass destruction, to secure those sites, to do that kind of examination of the intelligence and so forth. Exactly how many people it will take, I don't know. But I don't think the estimates you've heard -- I think they are way on the high side of what is probably going to be required. QUESTION: [Dana Budeiri, Al-Jazeera] What will be the fate of the bases in Kuwait and Qatar? Will you downsize them? Will you maintain them at their current sizes? GENERAL MYERS: All that is being looked at right now and I can't give you an answer at this point. Clearly, one of the reasons we had U.S. forces in the region prior to this was to enforce the United Nations Security Council resolutions on Iraq, the 16 resolutions, I think, that existed before -- maybe the 17 -- before 1441. And so those forces that were in Turkey for that purpose, they have already returned home. You know, we had forces in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, as well, and clearly they are not going to be needed in the future for that. So that's all going into the examination of this. And I think that some time here in the fairly near future we will be able to publicly talk about what kind of U.S. footprint would be in the region. Yes, sir, right here. QUESTION: Khalid Hasa, Daily Times, Lahore, Pakistan. The destruction of the Iraqi antiquities has been described as the greatest catastrophe, cultural catastrophe, in human history. I would like to know how it was allowed to happen, especially when the Pentagon had repeated warnings that these antiquities needed to be protected because they were the heritage of the entire mankind. But -- so what would you say, sir? GENERAL MYERS: I think what I would say to somebody who said that this is the greatest catastrophe in human history that you would probably find some Iraqis who may say that watching their son or daughter or brother or wife tortured in front of them might be a greater catastrophe. So I think we need to keep this in perspective. Obviously, if antiquities were destroyed, it's not a good thing. But in war you have your priorities. And you're right. We worked very hard with archeologists and other historians who knew where a lot of the sites were in Iraq. And General Franks got a list of sites, not just in Baghdad, but throughout the country, that had a lot of potential for more exploration, in terms of archeology, and so forth. And the coalition made every effort not to strike those sites. And so that's part of the care, I think, you see in this. Clearly, when you're in Baghdad, where some of this activity took place, you're in there for combat. And so you prosecute combat. At the same time -- that museum was being looted, perhaps by criminals -- we had Americans being wounded and dying in Baghdad. So your priorities, of course, are to finish the combat task. If, as some had said, well, you should have stopped, you should have taken care of that, my answer to that would be: Any time you stop the combat operation and you prolong it, that the chance of more combat casualties and noncombatant casualties would increase because of the length of the conflict. So, from just a humanitarian standpoint, you would want to finish your combat operation as fast as possible. And so, as Secretary Powell said today, we are working on certain incentives for people to bring back some of the antiquities that allegedly have been taken, and so forth, and we'll work on that. Yes, follow up. QUESTION: Mohameed Elsetouhi, Nile News Channel, Egyptian Television. Just on CNN today, now I saw that correspondent talking about the oil ministry being fully protected, while these antiquities were just open to the looters to come in and steal whatever they want. And he was even wondering about these priorities for you. My other question is about Baghdad. You're expecting a tough battle there, but it ended up easier than Umm Qasr. Any military explanation for what happened in Baghdad? GENERAL MYERS: First off all, I haven't heard the CNN report, Mohameed. I do know that in Baghdad, we had the city divided in sectors and we work it sector, by sector, by sector. Today, there are still four or five sectors where it is a very dangerous place to be. There is still combat going on -- now, not against large forces, but against small forces that can still kill. So there are still sectors that are not secure. Whether one ministry or another was protected or not protected, I can't answer that. I don't think there were any priorities like that. I think it was probably more opportunistic, depending on what sector various buildings and ministries and things were. Clearly, one of the things we're very interested in is gathering intelligence on terrorists and on weapons of mass destruction and on regime behavior towards the Iraqi people. So where we think those documents and so forth are, we are going to devote some effort to getting at them. In terms of the defense of Baghdad, I would say from the time we met the major defense of Baghdad, south of Baghdad, by the Republican Guard, that the defense was -- was probably -- they had a lot of forces, but it very quickly gave way to our force. And then once we got to Baghdad, I can't explain it other than it just didn't materialize in the way that we anticipated it probably would. I think part of that is by the aggressiveness of coalition forces. They very quickly went into the city, probably surprised a lot of people. They were very effective against the paramilitary, the Fedayeen Saddam, Special Republican Guard, Special Security Organization, and they faded very, very quickly. I think we'll just have to wait as we do more debriefings of either prisoners of war or other Iraqis that had some knowledge of how they planned on defending Baghdad. It'll probably take some time to sort all this out on why Baghdad was defended in the way that it was. QUESTION: Where did they go was the question, soldiers and the equipment -- GENERAL MYERS: Well, most of the equipment was destroyed. The Republican Guard equipment, most of that has been destroyed in the fighting or subsequently. In terms of soldiers, there were many killed. And obviously there were many that probably are back in, trying to blend into the population. And that will be one of the things -- you know, the ones that more closely associated with the regime that may have records of atrocities against the Iraqi people -- those people will need to continue to be hunted down and dealt with, as a matter of fact. Yes, sir. QUESTION: I'm Ali Farhoodi from Radio Farda, broadcasting to Iran. General Myers, in the beginning of the war, U.S. Forces bombed the Ansar al-Hizbollah -- Ansar al-Hizbollah were aligned with the al-Qaida -- and destroyed their bases. There is another group active in Iraq, used to be active, an opposition group, Iranian opposition group by the name of Mujahedin-e Khalq, MKO. There have been persistent reports, General, that U.S. Forces have bombed their bases. I would like to get your reaction to this. And if so, do you think this will help improve the ties between U.S. and Iran? Thank you, General. QUESTION: To the latter question, that's a political question. I can't answer that. But we did bomb some, what we called MEK, but maybe it's MOK or MKO camp. And we are still pursuing elements of MEK inside Iraq. It's possible some of them may surrender very soon to coalition forces, as a matter of fact. So we're still interested in that particular group. How that will affect U.S.-Iranian relationships, I think we're going to have to wait until more time goes by. It's a better question for Secretary Powell than it is for me. Right there. QUESTION: My name is Yilmaz Polat, Turkish TV 8. Sir, there are more than 5,000 PKK terrorists still in Northern Iraq. What will happen to them? What's your policy? GENERAL MYERS: Well, as I said, there are Turkish liaison elements with U.S. Forces inside the northern part of Iraq to watch and see what is happening there. That will continue. Clearly, anybody that has committed acts of terrorism or other crimes or atrocities, you're going to have to deal with them, as appropriate. I'm not going to refer specifically to the group, but it would be the same for all groups. Nobody can escape taking responsibility and being dealt with appropriately if they've created acts of inhumanity or terrorist acts on other people. So it has got to be dealt with appropriately. Yes, sir. Right -- right -- QUESTION: My name is Tammam Al-Barazi from Al-Watan Al Arabi Magazine. General, the Kuwaiti Minister met with you and others in the Pentagon and he said, "We have our list of the Iraqi war criminals and we are going to pursue them all over the world, wherever they are found." I mean they are talking like almost a superpower. Are you also -- you have your own list also besides the Kuwaiti to pursue all over the world? GENERAL MYERS: Well, first of all, I think it's important to recognize that there are many, many Kuwaiti prisoners of war that had been in Iraq. And I think the first order of business, and has been, by coalition forces, is to try to find those prisoners of war, as well. Other than that, I did not hear the Kuwaiti Minister on that particular case and I'm not going to try to speak for Kuwait. Obviously, I'll just go back to my earlier statement. Those members of the Iraqi regime that committed atrocities against the Iraqi people that, perhaps, participated in terrorism need to be dealt with, and they should be dealt with, and they will be. I'm going to go right here in the red -- in the red outfit right there. QUESTION: Thank you. Hanan Elbadry, Egyptian Television. Some known Iraqi community leaders refused today to attend an-Nasiriyah meeting. Do you believe such an act will affect your plan especially your political plan, on the short- and long-run? And also, are you still considering to allow bad forces, which is militant forces in Iran now, to enter Iraq? And also we need to know more details regarding the mission of the Ambassador Tutwiler. GENERAL MYERS: That's a lot of questions. On the situation today with the meeting they had just outside Talil Air Base near Nasiriyah, I think this process is not going to be one that's going to start off clean and very tidy at first. It's going to be untidy. There will be those that want to be part of it or not part of it. What the coalition is trying to do and the U.S., is just to facilitate the beginnings of some form of self-governance. And I can imagine the beginnings will be quite untidy. Having said that, I think the reports I've had from the way this meeting went -- and this is a little bit outside the military realm, this is more on a political side -- but people seem very satisfied with this first meeting. And I would imagine the next time they have a meeting, that those that elected not to participate may want to participate in the future. Again, that will be up to the Iraqi people. We'll try to facilitate that. And in terms of the Badr Corps, they should not be inside Iraq. That's not appropriate for them to be inside Iraq. And I think our request all along is for them to return to Iran. Your last piece was on [Ambassador Tutwiler] -- right, she joins Mr. Garner, I think, shortly. And as more and more of this effort turns into the humanitarian assistance piece, trying to facilitate the Iraqi people taking over the governance of their own cities and towns and ministries, and so forth, that she's going to be an advisor for that. She has a good background, having just come as Ambassador to Morocco. And so she'll be helping that effort. She brings a lot of energy to the equation as well. So we're delighted she'll be on board. She should be there very, very shortly I think. Yes, sir, right here. You have been very persistent, and I have worked all around you here. QUESTION: [Ahmed] Elbashir from Sudan. And some countries have been warned or pointed at as being next. As the top military man, do you think that the military phase is over and now back to diplomacy, or you might be called to do something? GENERAL MYERS: Well, that will be up to the political leadership. Those aren't decisions that we in the military make. Clearly, there is still the war on terrorism. The goals haven't changed since day one. The goals being: Don't harbor terrorists; to try to stop weapons of mass destruction -- biological, chemical and nuclear -- from falling into the hands of terrorists; and then defeating and destroying international terrorist organizations wherever they are. Those goals remain. There are still countries out there that help facilitate international terrorists. There are countries out there that have weapons of mass destruction. And so we have, you know, political leadership to decide those sorts of issues. But that will not be something that the military will decide. Now I'm going to go -- one last question. Way in the back, right there with the mustache. QUESTION: I have one, too. (Laughter.) GENERAL MYERS: I used to have one, but -- QUESTION: Thank you, General. This is Mohameed Sadeq, Al-Sharq Al-Awsat Newspaper. How long will take the United States and its allies to announce they won the war? GENERAL MYERS: It's a good question. I think major combat is over, but there is still much to do and there are WMD sites to secure and so forth, so it will be political objectives that will have to be met to declare victory, and I can't tell you when that's going to happen. It won't be on a timeline. It will be on the events, as we achieve the objectives that we set out to achieve. And some of them we've talked about. We've talked about the WMD, securing the sites. We've talked about an Iraqi government that has stood up and that has the characteristics we talked about earlier. And so it will be event-driven. Hopefully, it will go very smoothly and it will go very quickly, but it remains to be seen. One last question. The one with the mustache here. (Laughter.) QUESTION: Sir, I mean actually, I'm going to be greedy. I have two quick questions. GENERAL MYERS: Two? QUESTION: My name is Khaled Dawoud, I'm from Egypt's Al-Ahram Newspaper. We didn't receive yet any sensible answer to the fate of President Saddam, and not just him, the rest of his whole cabinet. You know, where did they go and how come the United States doesn't know anything about them? And then, sir, when Mr. Rumsfeld yesterday said that Syria did chemical tests, is this an accusation that you will pursue, or a statement of a fact, where it stops there? GENERAL MYERS: I think, on the last one, I think that was a statement of fact. On the fate of Saddam Hussein, his sons and the senior leadership, we have seen lots of reporting on the fate of Saddam Hussein, none of it convincing enough or conclusive enough to me to say we know the fate of Saddam Hussein or his sons. And so I'll stick with that we don't know and that the important point is that the regime is no longer in control and that the people of Iraq, the people of Baghdad, are starting to take measures to govern themselves. As I said, they are starting to stand up their own police forces and so forth, as you saw on some of the television news. There were police officers in Baghdad back in uniform starting to help restore order to that city. Those are all very good signs. Obviously, a lot of these senior leaders fled. My guess is that they're hiding in places in Iraq that we either haven't been or haven't been told about yet. You know, eventually we'll probably find a lot of them. Some of them have obviously left the country and have gone other places, and over time we'll learn where those places are and there will be tremendous pressure to bring them back so they can be dealt with either by the Iraqi people or others who might be very interested in them. Okay, since I didn't get to you -- I'm sorry? QUESTION: How did you get the (inaudible)? QUESTION: From his brother. GENERAL MYERS: His half-brother, right. And do you have a question? Okay. A non-mustached next question? And this is absolutely the last one. This is the last one. I'm sorry. QUESTION: This is Hasan Hazar, Turkiye Daily. I would like to follow up the question of before. General, please be specified, what kind of military cooperation with Turkey in Northern Iraq, and do you think to ask Turkey to send some troops for security or strategical purposes in near future? GENERAL MYERS: First of all, let's just step back a minute and talk about overall Turkish-U.S. relationships. This has been a very important and strategic relationship for both Turkey and the United States for some time. The Chief of the General Staff there, General Ozkok, is a friend of mine and also a peer as we try to work through security issues in the region. I talk to him about every week. I guess in the last week I have not talked to him, but before that we were talking sometimes more than once a week. General Jones at EUCOM talks to him regularly, trying to coordinate our efforts. I think it's too early to say what kind of force and what part of that force might be Turkish in Northern Iraq, but that's certainly one of the issues that's to be discussed. The Turkish forces inside Northern Iraq right now that are with U.S. forces are there specifically to keep the Turkish General Staff and the Turkish politicians informed on exactly what is happening. You know there are lots of rumors that start up, and they're there to either confirm or deny that things are happening and to provide a sense of truth on the ground, if you will, onto what is really happening inside Northern Iraq. And that will continue, I think, for as long as we're in there. Thank you. No, that's -- QUESTION: General, what type of military will Iraq have? GENERAL MYERS: Iraq will have a military that will not be a threat to its neighbors, that will be able to provide for its security needs, but that can't threaten its neighbors. Thank you very much. (end transcript) (Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)
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