Judd Gregg: “those of us who listened to Prime Minister Allawi today could not help being overwhelmingly impressed by the courage and…”

“those of us who listened to Prime Minister Allawi today could not help being overwhelmingly impressed by the courage and the strength of this individual, as he outlined the hopes and dreams of his nation, which he is leading as an interim Prime Minister, and which nation is obviously going through tremendous strain and stress. The points the Prime Minister made which I thought were so telling were, first, that the people of Iraq do want independence and they do want liberty and they do want freedom, that they will hold elections, and that they have overcome great odds, 30 years of despotism of the most horrifying kind--tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, potentially millions of their citizenry being savagely treated and killed by Saddam Hussein. They have come through that. They have moved toward democracy, and they intend to hold elections in January. That is a statement of extraordinary strength. Secondly, he made the point, which I think is a telling and appropriate point, that Iraq has become the frontline of the fight against terrorists.”