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I can't tell you if the use of force in Iraq today will last five days, five weeks or five months, but it won't last any longer than that.
Now:
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JIM LEHRER: Rightly or wrongly, Mr. Secretary, I went back and checked the record today, the impression that was given in public statements and all that sort of thing was that when this war ended, this war was going to end, that when Saddam Hussein and his regime, you know, fell, then the rest of it was going to be kind of a mop-up. And I'm just --
DONALD RUMSFELD: Not by me.
JIM LEHRER: Okay. All right.
DONALD RUMSFELD: You don't have quotes from...
JIM LEHRER: I don't have mop-up quotes and that sort of thing from you. But there was a general impression, as I say, rightly or wrongly…
DONALD RUMSFELD: There were some people who were quite optimistic that there would be a surrender of their army in a formal way.
JIM LEHRER: Right.
DONALD RUMSFELD: In fact, what happened was they didn't surrender. The intelligence was not perfect on that. They bled into the countryside. We had maybe ten, twelve thousand surrendered out of a much bigger universe.
JIM LEHRER: But you do understand why people ask questions that are like I just asked you, do you not?
DONALD RUMSFELD: Sure, we've got 24 hour news. People are impatient.
JIM LEHRER: No, no I'm not talking about news. I'm talking about, you know, the impression that was left....
DONALD RUMSFELD: Some people, as I say, did leave the impression that their view was that. My view was I didn't know. And I didn't ever give optimistic suggestions because I knew I didn't know.