We've got to ensure that the quality and the capability of these forces will be good enough to withstand the challenges that the insurgents and the terrorists will present to the new Iraqi government.

I believe we've... we've worked very hard with the Iraqis to build a better place ever since the fall of Saddam's government.

But the truth of the matter is that there is there is an opportunity for them to participate in the economic and political future of the country and certainly in the security life of the country.

Well, the hardest thing to do, as we know from our own experience on 9/11 is protect everything all the time.

Clearly the Secretary of Defense, my boss, would like nothing better than to get Osama bin Laden and to get... to ensure the complete defeat of al-Qaida, because we know that al-Qaida is planning operations against the United States even as we speak here.

Capturing any member of any terrorist cell or any insurgent cell that we may happen to come across is always very, very valuable, and the thing that interests me is that in most instances after a time people talk and they tell us what they know.

You know as well as I do that counterinsurgency is a very nuanced type of military operation.