We try very quickly to show that we are not at war with the Iraqi people. We're trying to deal with the people who are indeed themselves at war with the Iraqi people.

While it's very hard to know exactly how to measure public opinion there, because there's no really good polling, the fact of the matter is, in all of the polls I've seen, the vast majority of the Iraqis prefer to be free and are pleased that the coalition freed them.

You know, the country is basically peaceful.

If you look back today over the last 25 years, it is a fact that we have had a progressive degeneration of our intelligence community in general; in particular in the field of human intelligence.

The loss of innocent life is a tragedy for anyone involved in it, but the numbers are really very low.

I think the Iraqi people have shown extraordinary patience and courage in the last few months. They have really put a political system on the way to success, to a real democracy here.

We're going to be on the ground in Iraq as soldiers and citizens for years. We're going to be running a colony almost.