Huntsman visits Utah Guard troops

On his second visit to the Middle East this year, Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. said he's offering thanks to Utah troops but expressing concern to foreign leaders about the lack of progress in Iraq.

During an overnight visit to Baghdad, Huntsman said he and the governors of New York, New Jersey and Oregon told an Iraq deputy prime minister that Americans are beginning "to lose focus of what success means and what our ultimate goals are" in Iraq.

That's true even in Utah, the governor said, despite the state's strong support for President Bush and his efforts against terrorism and with what's now being labeled by some as a civil war in Iraq.

"I think anyone watching the evening news and reading the papers would have to be somewhat concerned about the level of progress and the willingness on the part of the Iraqi government to accept more responsibility," Huntsman said.

The four governors are in the Middle East at the invitation of the U.S. Defense Department and will travel to Afghanistan before returning this weekend. Huntsman said they have already visited troops in Kuwait and spent Tuesday night in Baghdad.

He called the loss of Utah National Guard 2nd Lt. Scott B. Lundell in Afghanistan "a real tragedy" and said he'll offer his condolences to members of Lundell's I-Corps Artillery unit, which includes more than 100 Utahns. Lundell, 35, was killed Saturday during a firefight.

Huntsman said he sat down with members of the Utah National Guard's 2-211th Aviation Battalion on Wednesday morning. "They wanted to talk about the home front, the Jazz, the BYU-Utah game," he said. "They're thinking about home."

The governor said the "situation has deteriorated" in Baghdad since he was there in March as part of a delegation of governors and members of Congress to the region led by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.

"It's a very disturbing turn of events," Huntsman said. Although a government is now in place, "while making the transition, they seem to be caught in a crossfire of sectarian angst and violent actions on the part of rebel groups."

Still, he stopped short of saying the country is in the grips of a civil war, even though that term is being increasingly used to describe the violent conflict between various factions.

"I've asked the best minds I could find whether they're officially at the point of civil war or not, and even the best minds disagree," the governor said. "But one thing for sure is that it's a dangerous environment and that will continue to escalate in the weeks ahead."