In the Oval Office on December 19, 2006, “Just two months after declaring that ‘absolutely, we’re winning’ in Iraq, [President] Bush adopted a formulation [Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General] Peter Pace had used at a congressional hearing. ‘We’re not winning, we’re not losing,’ Bush said. Asked about his previous statement, Bush recast it as a prediction, not an assessment. ‘Yes, that was an indication of my belief that we’re going to win,’ he said.”
– Peter Baker, Days of Fire, Page 521