General David Petraeus, Commander of U.S. Central Command, Meeting with President Mubarak

June 29, 2009

Salam alaikum, saba al khair, good morning and shukran gazeelan for being here this morning.

I just met with President Mubarak, of course, for nearly an hour and a half. We had a very good, very constructive discussion of a wide range of issues affecting our two countries. We focussed most, of course, on regional security issues, including the situations in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran; as well as the efforts to counter piracy, armed smuggling, and violent extremist organizations.

My visit also provided an opportunity to thank President Mubarak for his hospitality during the historic visit of President Obama—one that all Americans were proud to see—and I noted the positive reaction that I have heard, throughout the region, to President Obama’s speech at Cairo University. The United States has long felt privileged to have Egypt as an important, strategic partner. Indeed, I have been coming to Egypt since I was a young captain.

All of us who wear the uniform in the United States value our strong military cooperation and the many programs that we have with Egypt’s armed forces. The relationship between the militaries of Egypt and the United States, and the relationships that we have together with other countries in the region, help to advance common goals of peace and security in the region. We look forward to strengthening the relationships between Egypt and the United States in the years ahead, as we also look forward to working together on a wide range of issues of mutual interest in this region. Shukran Gazeelan.

I’ll take a couple of quick questions, though I have to note that I’m late already for meetings with General Soliman and Field Marshall Tantawi.

Question: “With the unrest in Iran, would the US consider military involvement in the region?”

Well, first of all, I think everyone is really waiting and seeing right now what develops in Iran. I should note though that this past week in Washington I hosted the chiefs of defense staff, including General Samy from Egypt, for our conference of “chads” as we call them. And among the topics were continuing, really, the process that we have of building what we call the regional security architecture. This is a network or a “network of networks” that is comprised of operations that we conduct together. Maritime operations, countering piracy, exercises - air, ground and sea exercises, headquarters that we have in the region,the exchange of military students with each other, various equipment programs, including for example, the effort that we have mutually with Egypt to build M1 tanks in your country, and so forth. And all of that, frankly, is continuing as it has, and if anything frankly, we have seen more cooperation and more interest in these different programs, in part because of the activities of Iran, because of its rhetoric and because of its actions.

You heard General Oderno yesterday in Iraq note that Iran has continued to arm,fund, train, equip and direct the actions of some extremist elements inside Iraq that do continue to cause security problems for the land of the two rivers, for the new Iraq in ancient Mesopotamia, a country in which I spent four years, and it is our hope—and it is the Iraqi’s hope—that over time they can develop a constructive relationship, one that is based on mutual respect and respect for each other’s sovereignty, instead of a relationship in which one side is undermining the security of the other.

Question: “This policy in Iraq of pulling the troops from Iraq comes at a time when you are sending more troops into Afghanistan. What is it the military didn’t achieve but needs to achieve now?”

Well, first of all, let me just speak briefly about Iraq and then I can talk briefly about Afghanistan and Pakistan, because I’ve just spent four days in those two countries. With respect to Iraq, the recent sensational attacks not withstanding— and those are of concern, needless to say, to the Iraqi leaders as well as to their U.S. partners and to me—nonetheless, for the past six months, the average number of attacks per day in Iraq has been between 10 and 15, now that is considerably less than the 160 attacks per day that we saw, for example, early during the so called “surge,” and you’ll recall that I was the commander in Iraq for that 19 month period. In June 2007, there were 160 attacks per day. That has now been reduced to about between 10 and 15 attacks, and this includes violent criminal activity as well.

Certainly there is concern with the increase in the sensational attacks where there have been major loss of life, but in general—again—the level of attacks has been in that band between 11 and 15, and we believe that that will continue. You know, we don’t immediately on the 30th just drive out of the cities, we have been doing this for years, literally.

We have been handing off, transitioning, security tasks to our Iraqi partners as they have grown in capability, grown in number, and grown in capacity to do that as we have helped equip them, as well as they’ve purchased weapons around the world. And the fact is that they now have over 650,000 police soldiers, or police members of the Iraqi security force. Certainly they will be the first to tell you that there is still considerable work they need to do to be able to carry out the full spectrum of tasks, but of course we will still be there. We will have coordination centers, they have been agreed in certain locations in Baghdad and also in Basra. In those centers there will still be cooperation, sharing of information, intelligence, access to our so called “enablers”— if they’re needed. They’re needed very infrequently right now but if, for example, air platforms are needed, attack helicopters, unmanned aerial vehicles, and so forth. But again, as that level of violence has been reduced substantially, that necessity has been much less. And so while certainly there will continuing challenges there are many, many difficult political issues, social issues, governmental development issues, we feel confident in the Iraqi military forces continuing the process of taking over the security tasks in their own country.

As we turn to Afghanistan, there’s no question that the security situation in that country has gone downwards, it has spiraled downwards in a bad direction, over the course of the past two years in particular. Particularly in certain areas of the country. It’s about 10 percent of the areas that have about 70 percent of the violence—these are largely the Pashtun insurgent areas, the Taliban, and also the Hakkani network, and some other organizations linked to the extremist elements that are in the federally administered tribal areas of Pakistan. We are in the process of more than doubling the number of our forces on the ground, more than doubling the number of helicopters, providing additional— again— enablers, unmanned aerial vehicles and so forth. We are also substantially increasing the number of civillians that we have on the ground. So, if you will, there’s a political surge that is going to match the military surge, and, of course, there are also between five and 10 thousand additional, non U.S. NATO forces that will also be going into the country. That should be adequate to help the Afghan forces secure the elections on the 20th of August, to begin the process of stopping the spiral downward in security and then begin to improve security in those areas in which the country has been particularly challenged, such as Helmand province, Kandahar, and certain areas in eastern Afghanistan as well.

With respect to Pakistan, I visited there yesterday, I spent time in Peshawar, meeting with the 11th Corps commander, which has done a superb job conducting operations to clear the miscreants, as they term them, theTaliban exremists in the Malakand division, and Swat, Dir, Buner, they now are in the process of preparing the areas for the return of the internally displaced persons. The 1st corps commander, Lieutenant General Nadeem has been put in charge of that, he’s well qualified for it, he was the deputy commander of the earthquake relief effort that took place several years ago, and did a superb job. I believe they have a solid program, first of all for taking care of the internally displaced persons right now, all of the governmental agencies together, and then for returning them to Dir, Buner, Swat Valley, and so forth.

As they have announced, there were also operations going on in certain of the federally administered tribal areas in Bajaur Mohmand, and now in Southern Waziristan as well. They have talked about operations against Baitullah Mehsud and his organization again in Waziristan, he being the extremist leader against whom the entire country of Pakistan has united, because of the extremist attacks, the suicide bombings that have taken place, and have killed innocent Pakistanis, destroyed infrastructure, targeted governmental officials, and so forth. Frankly, yesterday’s visit was encouraging. This is the Pakistanis fighting their war—this is not the Pakistanis fighting the global war on terror of the United States—this is their war against extremists who they see as threatening the very existence of thei r country. They see these individuals, these groups, as existential threats to Pakistan. And indeed, they are acting in response to that belief.

All of the political leaders are united against this. President Zardari has linked arms with Nawaz Sharif, and Prime Minister Gilani, and all the other political leaders against the Taliban, against Baitullah Mehsud, and against the other extremist elements that have been killing innocent Pakistanis. The clerics, have issued fatwas against them, the people are united and behind their soldiers who are carrying out these operations—well over 150 of whom have been martyred—and I might add that one in eight of those killed have been officers. So this is a case where the officers have been leading from the front in this fight. I just have enormous respect for what they have done, for the plans that they have executed already, and I might add, for the plans that they have for the future. There’s a saying in military terms, some of you who have been around the military, that amateurs do tactics, professionals do logistics. When you’re doing counter insurgency, amateurs do clearing, professionals do holding and building. We would say that anybody could clear, but it is possible to clear an area—we did it in Iraq many times, we cleared neighborhoods in Baghdad, in Ramadi, in Baquba, but unless you hold and rebuild in those areas, you will not be successful. And Pakistan has plans to hold and to rebuild, not just to clear in those areas, and they’re carrying those operations out in a very deliberate manner.

With that, I’m sorry for being so long, but I hope that gave you some insights about places where I’ve been recently and where I’ve served, as I’ve mentioned in the case of Iraq for four years. I truly feel honored to be back in your country, as I mentioned my first trip here was as a young captain, and even though I may say “Ana Iraqi” or even “Ana Maslowi” where I spent my first year, my first visit to an Arab country was here, and it’s great to be back. Shukran Gazeelan, thank you.