The U.S. must renounce any U.S. interest in constructing permanent U.S. military bases in Iraq.

The U.S. is not constructing a palatial embassy, by far the largest in the world and virtually a separate city within Baghdad, and pouring money into military bases, with the intention of leaving Iraq to Iraqis.

Second, the resolution contains the blatantly false assertion that negotiating a timeline for bringing U.S. troops home with the Iraqi government undermines U.S. national security. Such a statement shows a misunderstanding of the enemy we face in Iraq.

Such equipment in the hands of Iraq may pose a direct military threat to U.S. and coalition armed forces. We thus have raised the issue with the Russian government a number of times, including at senior levels, and particularly in the last two weeks.

One of the biggest differences in Baghdad, and throughout Iraq... is that the Iraqi military is doing really well, and they're taking over more pieces of the mission. The second biggest difference that I see [between now and three years ago] is the infrastructure issue.

I really like visiting military bases.