Rumsfeld warns against early Iraq troop pull-out

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N03235454.htm

Rumsfeld warns against early Iraq troop pull-out

WASHINGTON, Aug 3 (Reuters) - Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld warned on Thursday against pulling U.S. troops out of Iraq prematurely, saying it would be seen as a victory by extremists who want to control a region extending beyond the Middle East.

"If we left Iraq prematurely as the terrorists demand, the enemy would tell us to leave Afghanistan and then withdraw from the Middle East," he told the Senate Armed Services Committee at a hearing.

"And if we left the Middle East, they'd order us and all those who don't share their militant ideology to leave what they call the occupied Muslim lands from Spain to the Philippines," he said.

"And then we would face not only the evil ideology of these extremists, but an enemy that will have grown accustomed to succeeding in telling free people everywhere what to do."