Bush says Iraq war plan "meeting expectations"

GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. -- President Bush defended his Iraq war strategy Friday, saying the plan is working and "the direction of the fight is beginning to shift."

Despite assertions by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., that "the war is lost," Bush said that "so far the operation is meeting expectations," even as he raised the possibility that more troops arriving and conducting more military maneuvers could mean more U.S. casualties.

Using four flat-panel monitors to display aerial photos and graphics portraying what he said were shrunken positions of insurgent control in Ramadi, the president argued that the growing deployment of U.S. combat forces was having an effect.

Bush sought to connect al-Qaida to this week's violence in Iraq and suggested once again a link between those responsible for the mayhem there and the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in the United States.

"Al-Qaida believes its best chance to achieve its objectives is to drive the United States out of Iraq ... and leave Americans to conclude the sectarian killings will never be contained," Bush said.

Linking the fighting in Afghanistan to that in Iraq -- a connection that others challenge -- Bush said "our enemies made no distinction between borders. They view the world as a giant battlefield."

He acknowledged there was no intelligence tying Wednesday's bombings in Iraq, which killed more than 200 people, to al-Qaida. But he said "the men who attacked Iraqis" that day "swear allegiance to the same network" that attacked the United States 5 ½ years ago.

The president spoke at East Grand Rapids High School before an audience of 500 people made up primarily of members of the Western Michigan World Affairs Council, an organization that promotes discussion of foreign policy.

As evidence of progress, Bush said U.S. and Iraqi forces had received more tips about terrorist and insurgent hide-outs in the past three months than in any previous similar period.

"Block by block," he said, the U.S. troops were making "incremental gains in Baghdad."