DeLay praises troops
Says soldiers are coping with foreign fighters
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Tom DeLay in Baghdad: "The Iraqi people are starting to believe that the United States and the coalition forces are serious."
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BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- House Majority Leader Tom DeLay on Friday reiterated what the top U.S. commander in Iraq said yesterday -- that terrorist groups are infiltrating the country from Syria and Iran to fight the U.S. occupation.
DeLay, who is in Iraq as part of a Middle East tour, said the Iraqi people are starting to believe that the United States will hunt down former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. (Gallery: Chasing Saddam)
In praising the soldiers' resolve, DeLay, a Texas Republican, said in an interview on CNN's "American Morning" that troops are coping with "terrorists now coming in from Syria and coming in from Iran, all kinds of terrorist groups that they're going to have to face in the future."
On Thursday, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez said that foreign fighters are in the country.
As for the hunt for Saddam Hussein, who purportedly spoke on an audiotape broadcast by Al-Jazeera on Friday predicting the defeat of the coalition, DeLay says troops are "after him" and the citizenry is starting to realize that U.S. forces are going to capture him. (Iraq on Friday, full story)
"I have every confidence in talking to General Sanchez and others, other troops here on the ground, that if Saddam Hussein comes back, they'll get him."
DeLay said what's happening is that the coalition is generating confidence among the citizenry, sparked lately by killing Saddam's two sons.
"Who knows how many hours away that he is and how many hours it will take to capture him? That not the point."
"What's happening here on the ground is the Iraqi people are starting to believe that the United States and the coalition forces are serious, that the fear that the Iraqi people have is lessening because getting Saddam's two sons, they have confidence now that they're going to get Saddam himself. So things are improving, day by day here on the ground." (Consultation on the remains of Uday and Qusay Hussein)
DeLay said it is unfortunate that America is "losing some of our best," but attacks against American forces are "lessening" because of intelligence, successful raids and killing the enemy forces. (Interactive: Troop deaths in Iraq)
"It's amazing the professionalism that I've noticed. The morale is up," DeLay said. "They have a sense of accomplishment and they're feeling very good about the job that they're doing. They also understand how complicated this is in rebuilding a whole country from scratch."
