Bush says Iraq voted to resist civil war

By Kim Chipman, Bloomberg | August 8, 2006

President Bush yesterday rejected suggestions that Iraq is sinking into civil war, saying Iraqis made clear their intention to unify the country by voting in last year's elections for parliament.

``I hear people say `Civil war this, civil war that,' " Bush said at a news conference at his ranch in Crawford, Texas. ``The Iraqi people decided against civil war when they went to the ballot box."

The top US commander in the Middle East, General John Abizaid of the Army, told a Senate panel last week that fighting in Baghdad is at its highest level since the US-led invasion and threatens to split Iraq among sectarian factions. Some lawmakers, including Senator Chuck Hagel, Republican of Nebraska, have said there already is civil war.

Asked whether the United States and its allies misjudged how long it would take Iraq to form a stable, democratic government, Bush said ``a young democracy has been borne quite quickly."

``The Iraqi government has shown remarkable progress on the political front, and that is they developed a modern constitution ratified by the people," he said.

In testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Aug. 3, Abizaid said the United States didn't anticipate the rapid increase in sectarian tension that followed the February bombing of a Shi'ite shrine in Samarra. He and Marine General Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said civil war in Iraq, while possible, is not inevitable.

The inability of Iraqi forces to quell violence prompted the United States to move 3,500 more troops into Baghdad from other parts of the country and put plans for a possible drawdown of forces this year on hold.

American military deaths, including Defense Department civilian contractors, since the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003 totaled 2,585 as of Aug. 4, a Pentagon tally showed.