In Fort Bragg troops, Bush sought comfortable audience
Speech aimed at boosting image, military morale
WASHINGTON -- From his May 2003 ''Mission Accomplished" speech aboard an aircraft carrier and a Thanksgiving dinner in Baghdad, to last night's speech to troops in North Carolina, President Bush has had no shortage of telegenic moments on Iraq -- amid a nearly unrelenting string of bad news from the region.
With his approval ratings at the lowest of his presidency, Bush worked to rally lagging support for the war with his prime-time address at Fort Bragg, N.C.
The visit offered Bush one of his favorite audiences: row upon row of American soldiers.
''I recognize that Americans want our troops to come home as quickly as possible. So do I," Bush told the military crowd. But he restated his opposition to setting a timetable, saying, ''As Iraqis stand up, we will stand down."
The president's preference for friendly audiences is well established, demonstrated by Bush's repeated appearances before invitation-only ''town hall" crowds to promote his Social Security plan. It's a pattern he followed in his 2004 reelection campaign.
Few audiences are as predictably friendly as military ones, duty-bound to show respect for their commander in chief, often bursting into raucous whoops.
Bush's audience last night was unusually quiet while the president spoke, however -- applauding in unison after one key passage, as if on cue, and then at the end.
Already this year, Bush has twice visited Fort Hood, Texas; has spoken to US troops returning from Iraq at Wiesbaden Air Base in Germany; stood with armed-forces members in a Memorial Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery; and delivered the commencement address at the Naval Academy in Annapolis.
In appearing often with US troops, Bush ''can show genuine respect for the men and women who provide the first line of defense," said Wayne Fields, director of American culture studies at Washington University in St. Louis and a specialist on presidential rhetoric.
''It also provides something he can borrow," said Fields, enabling Bush to identify himself with the military's patriotism and sacrifice.
There are also the images of the war that the administration prefers not to emphasize: fallen Americans and Iraqis amid black smoke, fire, and bombing rubble. The flag-draped coffins coming to Dover Air Force Base in Delaware. Bush's private sessions on military bases with the families of the fallen, his visits to the wounded in military hospitals.
The conflict has cost the lives of more than 1,740 US troops since the war began in March 2003.
North Carolina has been hard hit. In the one year since the US-led coalition handed official sovereignty to Iraq, about 100 North Carolina-based troops have died in the war, second only to 180 from California. About 52,000 members of the military are stationed at Bragg and adjacent Pope Air Force Base, and some 14,700 are fighting in Iraq. North Carolina also has sent thousands of Marines from Camp Lejeune and air crews from two Air Force bases.
Bush sought to clarify the stakes after other US officials painted mixed pictures -- from Vice President Dick Cheney's assertion that the insurgency was in its ''last throes" to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's suggestion that the conflict could last 12 more years.
Bush also sought to shore up military morale and reassure conservatives jittery about the continued loss of life and rising price tag.
Some images of Bush with the troops have backfired.
When a flight-suit-clad Bush landed on the deck of the homeward-bound aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and proclaimed the end to major combat on May 1, 2003 -- under a huge ''Mission Accomplished" banner -- it seemed at first like a perfect Kodak moment, even to Bush detractors. But when violence increased instead of ebbing, the ''Mission Accomplished" episode became an object of ridicule to many. 