Bush: Execution Will Not Halt Violence

President Bush, right, with Vice President Dick Cheney, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice Thursday, Dec. 28, 2006 in Crawford, Texas walks toward waiting reporters to speak about a meeting with members of his national security team. Bush met with the team at his Texas ranch, and declared he has moved one step closer to devising a new Iraq strategy but will seek more advice before settling on a final plan. "We're making good progress," Bush said (AP Photo/Evan Vucci) (Evan Vucci - AP)

CRAWFORD, Texas -- President Bush called Saddam Hussein's execution a milestone on Iraq's road to democracy, but warned it will not halt the bloodshed and political discord splitting the country.

Bush, who has spent weeks crafting a new U.S. policy in Iraq, warned of more challenges ahead for American troops.

"Many difficult choices and further sacrifices lie ahead," he said in a statement released Friday night from his Texas ranch. "Yet the safety and security of the American people require that we not relent in ensuring that Iraq's young democracy continues to progress."

The president's statement had a sober, measured tone that contrasted with his offhand remark after U.S. troops found the deposed Iraqi dictator in an underground hideout in 2003.

"Good riddance," Bush said then. "The world is better off without you, Mr. Saddam Hussein."

Bush said Hussein received a fair trial _ "the kind of justice he denied the victims of his brutal regime." He said the trial, which ended with Saddam being sentenced to death, was a testament to the Iraqi people's resolve to move beyond decades of oppression and create a society governed by the rule of law.

"Fair trials were unimaginable under Saddam Hussein's tyrannical rule," Bush said.

Saddam's hanging comes at the end of a difficult year for Iraqis and for U.S. troops, he said. The U.S. death toll is nearing 3,000, and December is going down as one of the deadliest for American troops since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.

"Bringing Saddam Hussein to justice will not end the violence in Iraq, but it is an important milestone on Iraq's course to becoming a democracy that can govern, sustain, and defend itself, and be an ally in the war on terror," he said.

Bush was asleep when Saddam was executed for the killings of 148 Shiite Muslims from an Iraqi town where assassins tried to kill him in 1982. On Monday, Iraq's highest court rejected Saddam's appeal of the sentence and ordered him put to death.

At 6:15 p.m. CST, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley briefed Bush on the procedures for the execution, and told him it would take place in the next few hours. Hadley had been in touch with U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, who had been in contact with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

"The president concluded his day knowing that the final phase of bringing Saddam Hussein to justice was under way," deputy White House press secretary Scott Stanzel said.