U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld made a surprise visit to Iraq and called Iraq's leaders not to allow "turbulence or incompetence or corruption". Rather they should really put all their efforts into building up democracy in Iraq.

He said that US forces will not stay in Iraq forever, so people in Iraq will have to start taking care of their country themselves at some point.

U.S. Army General George Casey said that even though the training of Iraqi security forces is going well, they are still not ready to take charge in their country.

The date when US troops will leave the country has not been set.

The Cheers magazine feels that even though it might be a good time for Iraq to take charge in their own country, if the US troops would leave now, it would rather damage the country even more. US has previous experiences with this and eg. 5 years is not enough to help build democracy in a country. It would rather need 10, 20 or 30 years of guidance. Or the results might be rather disasterous.