US Presidency
2008

About the same time as we launched Operation Iraqi Freedom, coalition forces thousands of, hundreds of miles away launched an assault on the terrorists in the mountains of southern Afghanistan in an operation called Operation Valiant Strike. Throughout the war on terror, we have brought the enemy, we have fought the enemy on every single battlefront. And so long as terrorist danger remains, the United States of America will continue to fight the enemy wherever it makes its stand. We will stay on the offense. But in the long run, defeating the terrorists requires an alternative to their murderous ideology. And there we have another advantage. We've got a singular advantage with our military when it comes to finding the terrorists and bringing them to justice. And we have another advantage in our strong belief in the transformative power of liberty. So we're helping the people of Iraq establish a democracy in the heart of the Middle East. A free Iraq will fight terrorists instead of harboring them.