John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Hansard source

In a situation that is so difficult and fraught in Iraq, it is difficult, as he knows, for anybody to responsibly give ‘guarantees’, as he calls them. But I can, using that term in a very broad sense, guarantee that, if the approach that he is adopting were to be adopted by coalition governments, you could guarantee total chaos in Iraq; you could be certain of that. The point I was making, as he knows, in answer to the earlier question is very simply that, if participant governments in the coalition start nominating dates by which forces are going to be withdrawn, what they are doing is inviting our enemies, inviting the terrorists in Iraq, to persist with the destabilisation and the mayhem and the bloodshed in the certain knowledge that ultimately the nerve will be lost and ultimately a withdrawal will take place. The Leader of the Opposition knows that.

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