John Abizaid
John Abizaid
John Philip Abizaidis a retired United States Army general and former U.S. Central Commandcommander, overseeing American military operations in a 27-country region, from the Horn of Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, to South and Central Asia, covering much of the Middle East. CENTCOM oversees 250,000 US troops. Abizaid succeeded General Tommy Franks as Commander, USCENTCOM, on July 7, 2003, and was also elevated to the rank of four-star general the same week. He was succeeded by Admiral William J. Fallon on...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionSoldier
Date of Birth1 April 1951
CountryUnited States of America
We need to make it very clear to the Iranians, the same way we made it clear to the Soviet Union and China, that their first use of nuclear weapons would result in the devastation of their nation.
Why (anyone) would want to move against us in an overt manner that would cause us to use our air or naval power against them would be beyond me... We can generate more military power per square inch than anybody else on Earth, and everybody knows it... If you ever even contemplate our nuclear capability, it should give everybody the clear understanding that there is no power that can match the United States militarily,
Clearly, we understand that we've got an enemy that's in for the long term, al-Qaida and the associated groups that are aligned with it, ... We know that they've got a long-term strategy to fight, to gain ground, to gain influence. And it's very very clear that we've got to have the same sort of long term strategy to contest it. But the keystone to this strategy is helping the people in the region help themselves.
And clearly we know that the vast majority of the insurgents are from the Sunni Arab community.
We certainly will take whatever military action we need to defend ourselves and to prevent the enemy from taking advantage there,
The scope of devastation is gigantic. The level of work which has to be done is very immense,
there's actually some indication, based on intelligence information that we have, that ammo is starting to be difficult for them to obtain in certain areas.
We have decided to make sure that we're cautious about how we're operating, and I have nothing to say further than that,
Boots per square inch is not the issue. You have to have solid intelligence in a conflict such as this, so you can get to the terrorists,
Tell them we are winning, ... You don't define success as the absence of hard losses. You define it - are you defeating the enemy?
is to build an Iraqi security capacity, all the way from the police level up to the national army level, that is militarily effective and loyal to the established civil government.
If a legitimate government emerges that is broadly seen as being representative of Sunni, Shia and Kurdish interests, I think there is no reason to suppose that we can't bring force levels down in the spring,
If a legitimate government emerges in Iraq that is broadly seen as being representative of Sunni, Shia and Kurdish interests, I think there's no reason to suppose that we can't bring force levels down in the spring,
I believe, with the addition of those additional Iraqi forces, with the gelling of the Iraqi chain of command, with good leadership by Prime Minister Allawi and his ministers, that the elections will be able to be held,