WASHINGTON, March 19 (Xinhua) -- U.S. President George W. Bush defended on Wednesday the Iraq war as a "right decision" despite a high cost as thousands of Americans staged anti-war demonstrations across the nation to mark the war's fifth anniversary.

    "Removing Saddam Hussein from power was the right decision, and this is a fight America can and must win," Bush said during a speech at the Pentagon.

U.S. President George W. Bush defended on Wednesday the Iraq war as a "right decision" at the pentagon despite a high cost as thousands of Americans staged anti-war demonstrations across the nation to mark the war's fifth anniversary. (Xinhua Photo) Photo Gallery>>>

 

    With six sentences began with "because we acted," Bush bragged about how the war "benefited" Iraqi people by ending Saddam's regime.

    He also cited declining "Iraqi civilian death, sectarian killings and attacks on the U.S. troops," capture or killing of thousands of extremists and expansion of Iraqi security forces as the military progress achieved by the Operation Freedom in Iraq.

    "To ensure that military progress in Iraq is quickly followed up with real improvements in daily life, we have doubled the number of provincial reconstruction teams in Iraq," he added.

U.S. President George W. Bush defended on Wednesday the Iraq war as a "right decision" at the pentagon despite a high cost as thousands of Americans staged anti-war demonstrations across the nation to mark the war's fifth anniversary. (Xinhua Photo) Photo Gallery>>>

    However, Bush admitted that the Iraq war launched on March 20, 2003 became "longer, harder and more costly than we anticipated."

    "There's still hard work to be done in Iraq," he said. "The gains we've made are fragile and reversible."

    He reiterated his opposition to fast withdrawal of the current 155,000 U.S. troops from Iraq.

    "We have learned through hard experience what happens when we pull our forces back too fast. The terrorists and extremists step in, they fill vacuums, establish safe havens and use them to spread chaos and carnage."

    He said that he would wait for recommendation from top U.S. commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker, who will come to Washington to testify before Congress next month, before making any decision on the troop levels in Iraq.

    The speech did mention the ballooning war budgets nibbling the U.S. economy, the U.S. private security guards' violence resulting in Iraqi civilian death, the controversial interrogation tactics raising human rights abuse charges and the conclusion in a newly-released defense intelligence report indicating no relationship between Saddam's regime and al Qaida.

    A poll released by CNN on Wednesday presented a different picture of the Iraq war in U.S. public eyes.

    According to the poll, about 66 percent of the 1,019 adults surveyed opposed the Iraq war and 61 percent Americans said that troop withdrawal should begin in months after the inauguration of the new president next year.

    It also showed that 71 percent of Americans blamed the war spending in Iraq for the country's economic woes.

    Some U.S. known economists said last week that the Iraq war would wind up costing U.S. taxpayers about 3 trillion U.S. dollars.

Anti-war activists take part in a protest to mark five years of the war in Iraq during rush hour at Union Station in Washington March 18, 2008. (Xinhua/Reuters Photo) Photo Gallery>>>

    A number of demonstrations were staged and scheduled across the country on Wednesday, calling for the end of the war that has cost nearly 4,000 U.S. troops' lives and over 400 billion dollars through December 2007.

    Anti-war protestors block the entrance to the Internal Revenue Service and sought to focus attention on taxpayers' money that fund the war. They also disrupted the offices of lobbyists who represent military contractors and oil companies profiting from the war.

    From New Jersey to North Dakota, college students planned walkouts and shut down military recruiting offices on campus.

    Hundreds of protest events were also planned nationwide, including vigils and larger rallies in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Miami.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidates lambaste Iraq war

    WASHINGTON, March 19 (Xinhua) -- The U.S. Democratic presidential candidates turned their campaign rallies into an anti-war forum as the country marked the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war on Wednesday.

    Illinois Senator Barack Obama, who is vying to be the first African American president, delivered a major speech on the Iraq war at Fort Bragg military base in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Full story

News Analysis: High civilian casualties tarnish U.S.-imposed democracy in Iraq

    BEIJING, March 19 (Xinhua) -- High Iraqi civilian casualties over the past five years after the U.S.-led coalition forces toppled the Saddam Hussein regime have tarnished the U.S.-imposed democracy in the volatile country, analysts say.

    The coalition troops started an invasion into Iraq by bombarding the Iraqi capital Baghdad on March 20, 2003, and swiftly brought down the administration of Saddam Hussein, who was earmarked as a cruel dictator by the United States and some other Western countries. Full story

Feature: Five years after war, Iraqi families living trauma of displacement

    BAGHDAD, March 19 (Xinhua) -- "When the war broke out five years ago, my husband and I thought after it gets over, we could spend the rest of our lives like those in a Gulf or an European country. Now I ended up a lonely and displaced widow," said Um Waleed just before the fifth anniversary of the devastating U.S.-led invasion.

    The woman in her 60s, wearing black headscarf and all-covering abaya, lives with her two daughters and 11-year-old grandson, struggling for survival after she lost her husband to a battle between the U.S. troops and Iraqi insurgents more than three years ago in a Baghdad street. Full story

Iraqis get nothing but disappointment five years after Iraqi war

    BAGHDAD , March 19 (Xinhua) -- As the fifth anniversary of Iraqi war drew imminent, Iraqi people still strive for survival rather than enjoying a free and just life as they expected before the war.

    Before the U.S.-led war against Saddam Hussein's reign in 2003,the U.S. administration depicted a rosy future with freedom and justice of Iraq. Full story