New Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, speaking at a base outside Baghdad, tells American troops they're in Iraq 'because on 9/11 the United States got attacked,' even though pre-war evidence of a link between Al Qaeda and Iraq has been discredited. He later clarifies his remarks.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta speaks to troops during his visit to Camp Victory in Baghdad. Panetta, who took over the Pentagon earlier this month, has already had a few stumbles in his public comments. (Paul J. Richards / AFP/Getty Images / July 11, 2011)

By David S. Cloud, Washington Bureau

Reporting from Baghdad—

In language strikingly reminiscent of the Bush administration's justification for invading Iraq, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told a group of U.S. soldiers at a base outside Baghdad on Monday that "the reason you guys are here is because on 9/11 the United States got attacked."

His words seemed to be at odds with arguments made by President Barack Obama and other critics of the 2003 invasion, who have said that Al Qaeda, which carried out the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in the U.S., only developed a presence in Iraq after the Bush administration decision to overthrow Saddam Hussein.

---

• Related
• Panetta: Iranian weapons used to attack Americans in Iraq
• Panetta says U.S. is 'within reach' of defeating Al Qaeda
• Libya rebel council may include extremists, Panetta says
• U.S. willing to leave 10,000 troops in Iraq past year's end, officials say

---

In a previous online version of this article, Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta was incorrectly quoted as telling U.S. troops: "The reason you guys are here is because on 9/11 America got attacked." The correct wording is: "The reason you guys are here is because on 9/11 the United States got attacked." 

---

"The reason you guys are here is because on 9/11 the United States got attacked, and 3,000 Americans — not just Americans — 3,000 human beings got killed, innocent humans got killed, because of Al Qaeda, and we've been fighting as a result of that," he told soldiers at a large U.S. base near Baghdad.

Panetta, who took over the Pentagon earlier this month, quickly clarified that he had not meant that Al Qaeda had been in Iraq before the U.S. invasion, but that once it emerged in Iraq after 2003 it became necessary for U.S troops to respond. 

"I wasn't … going into the issues or the justification," for the invasion, he told reporters after his remarks. "It was more the fact that we really had to deal with Al Qaeda here. They developed a presence here." 

Although Panetta has had a 40-year career as a congressman, White House official and the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, he appears to still be adjusting to the intense scrutiny of every public utterance that comes with being Defense secretary.

In addition to a few initial stumbles in public statements that have necessitated quick clarifications, the 73-year-old son of Italian immigrants has shown a fondness for salty language that can sometimes sound more appropriate for a cigar-chomping sergeant than a Cabinet secretary. 

"This damn country has a hell of a lot of resources," Panetta said Monday, referring to Iraq and its vast oil wealth. Those comments came only seconds after he urged Iraq's government to quit dithering over whether to ask for U.S. troops to remain beyond the end of the year: "Damn it, make a decision," he said. 

Referring to the operation that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in May, Panetta said that as CIA director he worked with the military to "put together the plan" to "get that son of a bitch."

"This is a plain-spoken secretary," Douglas Wilson, the assistant secretary of Defense for public affairs, told reporters Monday, in an effort to explain Panetta's comments about Al Qaeda. "He's dealing with the security situation that our country faces today." 

As a former congressman, Panetta appears far more comfortable than his predecessor at the Pentagon, Robert M. Gates, at entertaining an audience of troops. Speaking to Marines at Camp Dwyer in southern Afghanistan on Sunday, he told a joke about a priest and rabbi at a boxing match. When the rabbi sees one of the fighters crossing himself before the bell, he asks the priest what the sign means.

"It doesn't mean a damn thing if he can't fight," Panetta said, drawing guffaws. 

But Panetta is also still trying to capture the nuances of the many issues he must stay on top of — a process that Gates, who also ran the CIA before taking over the Pentagon, also went through early in his tenure. 

To the Marines, who are working on training Afghan army units to take over security responsibilities in Helmand province, he mixed up which war zone he was in at the time: "If this is going to work we are going to transition to the Iraqi army and the Iraqi police." 

In Kabul on Saturday, in a brief question-and-answer session with reporters Panetta twice said that 70,000 U.S. troops would remain in Afghanistan through the end of 2014 — a formulation that seemed to ignore the fact the Obama has called for force levels to come down steadily over the next four years. 

The comments prompted Wilson to immediately assemble the dozen or so reporters traveling with Panetta to tell them: "There is no daylight between the secretary of Defense and the president" on bringing U.S. troops out of Afghanistan. He noted that there had been no decision on the pace of withdrawals beyond the 33,000 troops that will come out by September of next year. 

Panetta's comments to soldiers in Baghdad about Al Qaeda and 9/11 attacks also seemed to imply daylight between him and Obama — until Panetta clarified what he meant. 

Although Bush administration officials gave numerous reasons for invading Iraq over the years, including because Hussein was said to be developing weapons of mass destruction, one of the main arguments from Vice President Dick Cheney and others was that it was done because of pre-invasion links between Al Qaeda and Hussein.

That claim that has since been widely dismissed, including by Obama, who as long ago as 2005 called Afghanistan a "war launched directly against those who were responsible for 9/11" and Iraq "a preemptive war based on faulty evidence." 

Panetta is also having to adjust the grueling pace that comes with his new job. After flying all night to reach Afghanistan on Saturday, he went immediately into a meeting with PresidentHamid Karzai, followed by a lengthy dinner at the presidential palace. The next morning, after flying to southern Afghanistan he toured an Afghan army camp and addressed Marines in temperatures exceeding 100 degrees in a bleak, sand-blown corner of Helmand province.

Later, he took off for Baghdad, where the temperatures were even higher. His first morning in the capital, five rockets struck the Green Zone, the enclosed, fortified areas of downtown Baghdad a few hours before Panetta met with Prime Minister Nuri Maliki. 

This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it