Barack Obama is sticking to his 16 month troop withdrawal deadline, despite differing opinions from America's top miliary experts. Obama has been pushing the idea that all American combat troops will be out of Iraq by 2010. So far Obama has showed a lot of confidence on the issue, more than had been expected.

The media has been spending much time in the last 24 hours trying to get Obama to admit that the surge military strategy, which he was against, has worked. It hasn't been easy to do, as Obama refuses to conceed the point. He would admit that the surge has increased security in Iraq.

"No, no of course I have," he said. "There is no doubt that the extraordinary work of our U.S. forces has contributed to a lessening of the violence, just as making sure that the Sadr militia stood down or the fact that the Sunni tribes decided to flip and work with us instead of with al-Qaeda -- something that we hadn't anticipated happening. All those things have contributed to a reduction in violence."

Video analysis of Obama's visit to the Middle East