Donald Rumsfeld

reminding participants of the sacrifices of this generation and of each previous generation that have so successfully defended our freedoms.

We consider such trafficking as hostile acts and will hold the Syrian government accountable for such shipments,

Enemies of the legitimate Iraqi government' -- how's that

The only way the inspectors can find anything is if the Iraqi government cooperates and shows it to them, ... Inspectors can't find things. They can only inspect what they've been shown.

Our government has made a considered judgment that it was appropriate to transfer these individuals to the government of the United Kingdom,

We're gonna turn the Iraqi election into a big pageant, ... It'll be huge, as big as my hair.

In terms of having first-hand information, I just can't imagine that he does, ... The allegation is ridiculous.

This is an important moment in Iraqi history,

There are countries like Paraguay and others, their neighboring countries, they're all interested in being able to grow and function in a manner that's free of external influence and to do things in ways that fit their history and their circumstance,

probably unmatched in history.

be useful to take a moment to retrace the actual history.

It's an unfortunate fact of war that inevitably innocent civilians are killed. This has been true throughout the history of warfare and it remains true even in this age of advanced technology and precision-guided munitions,

We have no intention of doing either one to be perfectly honest. We have every intention of working out an arrangement with the Russians and I think we will,

In northern Iraq, U.S. troops shut down a pipeline Rumsfeld said was supplying oil to Syria in violation of U.N. sanctions. I cannot assure you that all illegal oil flowing from Iraq into Syria is shut off, ... I just hope it is.

My hope is that they will either be killed or taken prisoner.

Our hope is that there will be no new sanctuaries or havens for terrorist networks.

The idea of embedding a press pool into that group seems to me to be outside of the realm of reasonableness,

We just simply have no idea,

We do know that the Geneva Convention makes it illegal for prisoners of war to be shown and pictured and humiliated. And it's something that the United States does not do. And needless to say, television networks that carry such pictures are, I would say, doing something that's unfortunate.

central, important and indispensable.

Since the United States here has participated in developing Afghan security forces, led a group of coalition forces and took part in activities as a NATO member here, our reduction of forces will not influence the participation of the United States in rebuilding Afghanistan.

We do not have information that validates any of that. Indeed some of the numbers are ridiculous,

I think this constant quest for new information and smoking guns is misguided,

Almost every arrest leads to additional pieces of information. It may be scraps of information in their pockets, it may be things they say, it may be other connections that occur,

to embark on a diplomatic initiative to work with North Korea to see if they wouldn't reverse their position of violating these three or four agreements.