12月14日，美国总统布什为退休的四星级陆军上将汤米·弗兰克斯、前中情局局长乔治·特尼特和前美国驻伊拉克首席行政官保罗·布雷默等三人颁发了代表国家最高荣誉的“总统自由勋章”，并称他们是美国对伊政策的坚强后援，“在诸多重大事件中扮演了关键角色，为维护国家安全和推进人类自由事业不遗余力”。外电报道如下：President Bush awarded the nation's highest civilian¹ honor Tuesday to three men central to his Iraq policy, saying they had played "pivotal roles in great events."

Bush presented the Presidential Medal of Freedom to retired² Gen. Tommy Franks, who oversaw³ combat in Afghanistan and the initial invasion of Iraq, former CIA Director George Tenet and former Iraq administrator⁴ L. Paul Bremer.

Franks is a retired four-star Army general who commanded U.S. forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. He didn't decide until last summer to endorse⁵ Bush's re-election, but then spoke⁶ on the president's behalf at the Republican National Convention and campaigned for Bush through the fall.

Pivotal表示“枢轴的，中枢的，关键的”，例如，美国前国务卿基辛格（Henry A. Kissinger）曾说过这样的话：Its pivotal location has also exposed it to periodic invasions（其地点的重要性也使得它周期性地遭受侵略）。