[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 43, Number 4 (Monday, January 29, 2007)]
[Pages 84-85]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks Following a Meeting With Military Leaders and an Exchange With 
Reporters

January 26, 2007

    The President. I just had a full briefing with General David 
Petraeus about the way forward in Iraq. I want to thank the Secretary 
and General Pace, National Security Adviser for joining this discussion. 
Congratulations.
    Lt. Gen. David H. Petraeus. Thank you, sir.
    The President. The Senate confirmed this good man without a 
dissenting vote. I appreciate the quick action of the United States 
Senate. I appreciate them giving General David Petraeus a fair hearing, 
and I appreciate the vote. My instructions to the general is: Get over 
to the zone as quickly as possible and implement a plan that we believe 
will yield our goals.
    I thank the general and his family. I particularly want to thank 
your family for supporting you and supporting our Nation. One of the 
amazing things about our country is that we've got military folks who 
volunteer to go into a tough zone to protect the American people from 
future harm, and they've got families who stand by them. And whether you 
be a general or a private in the military, there is a U.S.--there's a 
family member saying, ``I love you, and I support you.''
    And so, General, I congratulate you, and I congratulate the 
volunteers and their families for making the hard decisions necessary to 
protect its people from a grave danger. And you're going into an 
important battle in this war on terror, and I give you my full support 
and wish you Godspeed.
    Lt. Gen. Petraeus. Thank you, Mr. President. If I could thank the 
Senate as well, thank my family, and above all, thank those great 
soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, and civilians who are out there on 
the frontlines of the global war on terror.
    The President. All right. I'll answer a couple of questions. 
Jennifer [Jennifer Loven, Associated Press].

War on Terror Strategy

    Q. Thank you, sir. The other night in your State of the Union 
Address, you asked Congress to give your plan a chance. But lawmakers, 
Democrats and Republicans, didn't really miss a step in starting to turn 
out resolutions against that plan. Why do you think it's okay to go 
ahead without their support?

    The President. One of the things I've found in Congress is that most 
people recognize that failure would be a disaster for the United States. 
And in that I'm the decisionmaker, I had to come up with a way forward 
that precluded disaster. In other words, I had to think about what's 
likely to work.

    And so I worked with our military and I worked with Secretary Gates 
to come up with a plan that is likely to succeed. And the implementor of 
that plan is going to be General Petraeus. And my call to the Congress 
is, is that I know there is skepticism and pessimism, and that they 
are--some are condemning a plan before it's even had a chance to work. 
And they have an obligation and a serious responsibility, therefore, to 
put up their own plan as to what would work.

    I've listened a lot to Members of Congress. I've listened carefully 
to their suggestions. And I have picked the plan that I think is most 
likely to succeed, because I understand, like many in Congress 
understand, success is very important for the security of the country.

    Let's see--Steven [Steve Holland, Reuters], yes, sir.

Iraq/Iran

    Q. Yes, sir. This policy of going after the Iranians inside Iraq, 
are you concerned that that could be a provocative act in the region?
    The President. I made it very clear, as did the Secretary, that our 
policy is going to be to protect our troops in Iraq. It just makes sense 
that if somebody is trying to harm our troops or stop us from achieving 
our goal or killing innocent citizens in Iraq, that we will stop them. 
That's an obligation we all have, is to protect our folks and achieve 
our goal.
    Now, some are trying to say that because we're enforcing--helping 
ourselves in Iraq by stopping outside influence from killing our 
soldiers or hurting Iraqi people, that we

[[Page 85]]

want to expand this beyond the borders. That's a presumption that simply 
is not accurate. We believe that we can solve our problems with Iran 
diplomatically and are working to do that. As a matter of fact, we're 
making pretty good progress on that front. As you know, the Iranians, 
for example, think they want to have a nuclear weapon. And we've 
convinced other nations to join us to send a clear message, through the 
United Nations, that that's unacceptable behavior.
     And so, yes, we're going to continue to protect ourselves in Iraq 
and, at the same time, work to solve our problems with Iran 
diplomatically. And I believe we can succeed. The choice is the Iranian 
Government's choice, see. And one of the things that the Iranian 
Government has done is, they've begun to isolate their nation to the 
harm of the Iranian people. And the Iranian people are proud people, and 
they've got a great history and a great tradition.
     Our struggle is not with the Iranian people. As a matter of fact, 
we want them to flourish, and we want their economy to be strong. And we 
want their mothers to be able to raise their children in a hopeful 
society. My problem is with a government that takes actions that end up 
isolating their people and ends up denying the Iranian people their true 
place in the world. And so we'll work diplomatically, and I believe we 
can solve our problems peacefully.
     Thank you all very much.

Note: The President spoke at 10:20 a.m. in the Oval Office at the White 
House. Participating in the meeting were Secretary of Defense Robert M. 
Gates; Gen. Peter Pace, USMC, Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff; Lt. Gen. 
David H. Petraeus, incoming commanding general, Multi-National Force--
Iraq; and National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley.