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M2 PRESSWIRE-14 August 2003-US DOD: News transcript. Page 2 of 2.(C)1994-2003 M2 COMMUNICATIONS LTD

RDATE:08132003

Q: Sort of an Iraq-related question, if I could. Today in Washington and tomorrow in Fayetteville, the families of military -- of soldiers over in Iraq are having press conferences, complaining about the duration of the stay and using words like "the Bush administration betrayed us" and "our son was killed for no good reason." In fact, one of the speakers was the father of a Marine who was killed on March 27th.

The group is called Bring Them Home Now.

I don't know if you've heard about this, but it begs for some kind of Pentagon response here. What do you tell families like that that are so angst and upset that they're going to the length of press conferences -- a national press conference down in Fayetteville, you know, the home of the 18th Airborne Corps?

Di Rita: I'll start, and General Schwartz may have a view on this, but obviously, these are families who are very committed to what their sons and daughters are committed to, which is this important U.S. security objective. So, it's a very difficult thing to put one in a position of having a son or daughter in the military; indeed, to have a son or daughter killed. So, I certainly respect that.

And they're going to express their views as they see fit.

And I would say that we are very aware of the importance of providing a sense of regularity to how forces will continue to move through the region -- through Iraq.

We've begun to do that to make it very clear that there is a rotation plan; that based on the current assessment of the situation and the current need for security capability, we'll be able to execute over the coming months.

We've seen now, I think, not withstanding some anxiety on this particular point, the 3rd Infantry Division has begun to rotate back. Our intention had been all along to get them back in the early fall. That's going to happen. It appears to be on-track and we've seen some significant number of the 3rd Infantry Division come home.

So, it's going to be the kind of thing where if we can establish some regularity, if the security circumstances permit us to maintain what we've established as the regular plan, people will understand that better and feel better about it. But there's no question that it's a -- as I've said before, Iraq remains a dangerous place. If a parent has a son or a daughter in Iraq, there -- it's perfectly understandable that they would be concerned about that.

Q: Are you surprised, though, that groups are organizing? It's relatively unusual, isn't it, in your experience, General Schwartz -- families would go out publicly and complain?

Schwartz: I think it's -- you know, we feel the same grief that the parents do, clearly. And every commander up and down the line surely does.

But I'd like to focus on the point about the rotation policy. Clearly, there is a need for predictability. That is the objective of the rotation policy. The tours will be up to one year in length. But each individual will know when they will...