George W. Bush

George W. Bush

In accordance with an agreement between the Office of George W. Bush and the Center for Presidential History, we are not publishing the original audio of our interview with President Bush, nor the original transcription of the interview. However, we have published excerpts from that interview in the book The Last Card: Inside George W. Bush's Decision to Surge in Iraq (Cornell University Press). 

Below, you may watch President Bush's address to the nation on January 10, 2007, when he announced what would become known as The Surge.

Click Here to download a transcription of this address announcing the Surge.

Biographical Note:

George W. Bush served as president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. Prior to this, Bush served as the Governor of Texas (1995-2000). During his State of the Union address in January 2002, Bush labeled Iraq as part of an "axis of evil" that posed a threat to the world, particularly because of the claim that Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. In March 2003, Bush ordered the commencement of Operation Iraqi Freedom, the American-led military invasion of Iraq, aimed at accomplishing multiple objectives, including removing Saddam Hussein from power, eliminating weapons of mass destruction, driving out terrorism, and creating conditions for a transition to representative self-government for the Iraqi people. By 2006, conditions in Iraq remained volatile and violent, prompting President Bush to embark upon a decision-making process which would lead to his January 2007 announcement to surge forces in Iraq as a strategy for victory.