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Gates: Iraq timetable debate may be helpful

AMMAN, Jordan — The push by Democrats to set a timetable for U.S. withdrawal from Iraq has been helpful in showing the Iraqis that American patience is limited, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday.

At the same time, Gates renewed his opposition to Congress actually approving any such timetable. Both the House and Senate have passed bills calling for an end to the war, and President Bush has said he will veto either version if it is given final approval.

“I’ve been pretty clear that I think the enactment of specific deadlines would be a bad mistake,” Gates said.

“But I think the debate itself, and I think the strong feelings expressed in the Congress about the timetable ... probably has had a positive impact — at least I hope it has in terms of communicating to the Iraqis that this is not an open-ended commitment,” he said.

Gates spoke one day after six Iraqi cabinet members loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr resigned because no U.S. withdrawal deadline had been set. He said he did not know whether their departure would lead to increased violence by Sadr’s Mahdi Army militia.

“I think the impact ... that these resignations have will depend, in some measure on who is selected to replace these ministers and their capabilities, and whether those vacancies are used in a way that can perhaps further advance the reconciliation process,” said Gates.

“There is the opportunity to turn what might seem like a negative potentially into a positive development,” he said.

Noting that the six ministers are remaining as members of the council of representatives and therefore not walking away from the process, Gates said it is still not clear what Sadr’s motives are for the split.

“In the intelligence business we divided all the information that we wanted to know into two categories — secrets and mysteries,” said Gates, a former director of the CIA. “I think that his motives right now, at least for me, are a mystery not a secret.”

Gates said that broadening the representation in the cabinet of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki could be helpful.

He spoke to reporters Tuesday after he met with Jordan’s King Abdullah II during the first stop of a Middle East trip. He had been expected to travel to Egypt later Tuesday, but was forced to delay for a day because of a severe sandstorm that engulfed Cairo, closing the airport for several hours.

Gates is urging U.S. allies in the Middle East to work more closely with the Iraqis in an effort to bolster Maliki’s fragile government.

He said that he and Abdullah discussed efforts in that regard, though he said some countries in the region do not yet have confidence that the Iraqi government represents all Iraqis.

He said he also talked to Abdullah about Iran and its activities in the region and “agreed that diplomatic and economic pressures were the most profitable way to get the Iranians to change their behavior.”

The U.S. and some of its allies have expressed concerns about Iran secretly developing nuclear weapons — a charge Iran denies.

The Iraqis are under growing pressure to move more quickly on political reconciliation so they can temper divisive sectarianism and tamp down the violence gripping the country.

Gates, who is making his third visit to the Middle East since taking over as defense chief last December, is also expected to meet this week with leaders in Israel.

The U.S. military, meanwhile, is increasing its presence in Iraq as part of the buildup ordered by Bush to try to quell the violence in Baghdad so that the Iraqi government can begin to stand on its own.

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