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  39% Say U.S. Winning War on Terror                       34% Say Terrorists Winning

Survey of 1,000 Adults

October 15-16, 2005

Who is Winning War on Terror?

U.S. / Allies 39%
Terrorists 34%
Neither 20%
Not Sure 7%

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October 17, 2005--Just 39% of Americans now believe the U.S. and its Allies are winning the War on Terror. That's little changed from 40% last month and 38% the month before.

During Election 2004, roughly half of all voters believed the U.S. and its allies were winning.

The latest Rasmussen Reports survey also found that 34% believe the terrorists are winning. That's down from 36% a month ago.

Huge partisan divisions on questions dealing with Iraq remain. Republicans by 64% to 21% margin overwhelmingly believe that the U.S. and its allies are winning.

However, 49% of Democrats believe the terrorists are winning and 19% believe the U.S. is winning.

Thirty percent (30%) of those not affiliated with either major party say the terrorists are winning. Thirty-three percent (33%) take the opposite view.

[More Below]



Thirty-four percent (34%) now believe that the U.S. is safer than it was before 9/11. That's down from 37% last month and 38% the month before. For the first time ever, 50% of Americans say the U.S. is not safer that it was before the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

Just 33% give the President good or excellent ratings for handling the situation in Iraq. That is down from 36% a month ago.

Thirty-two percent (32%) now say things will get better in Iraq over the next six months. That's up from 30% a month ago and 29%. Forty-five percent (45%) expect things to get worse.

At the beginning of 2005, just 28% of Americans thought the situation in Iraq would get better over the next six month. A Rasmussen Reports survey at the time found that 50% of Americans expected things to get worse.

Thirty-three percent (33%) of Americans believe that, in the long run, the U.S. mission in Iraq will be viewed as a success. Forty-seven percent (47%) believe it will be viewed as a failure. Those figures are also little changed from last month.

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Current results are not precisely comparable to 2004 survey results. Our 2004 data was based upon Interviews with Likely Voters. In 2005, our data is based upon a sample of American Adults. It is likely that this change could have a 2-3 percentage point impact on the reported results.

National Security issues were the most important voting issues of Election 2004.

Rasmussen Reports is an electronic publishing firm specializing in the collection, publication, and distribution of public opinion polling information.

Rasmussen Reports was the nation's most accurate polling firm during the Presidential election and the only one to project both Bush and Kerry's vote total within half a percentage point of the actual outcome.

During Election 2004, RasmussenReports.com was also the top-ranked public opinion research site on the web. We had twice as many visitors as our nearest competitor and nearly as many as all competitors combined.

Scott Rasmussen, president of Rasmussen Reports, has been an independent pollster for more than a decade.

To keep up with our latest releases, be sure to visit the Rasmussen Reports Home Page.

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The national telephone survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted by Rasmussen Reports October 15-16, 2005.  The margin of sampling error for the survey is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. (see Methodology)


Who is Winning the War on Terror?

Dates

US/Allies Terrorists
Oct 15-16 39 34
Sept 14-15 40 36
Aug 10-11 38 36
July 13-14 44 34
June 5-7 42 32
May 14-15 44 29
Apr 8-10 47 29
Feb 11-13 47 26
Jan 2-3 45 27
Dec 10-12 50 30
Dec 3-5 51 27
Nov 19-22 51 28
Nov 12-14 52 27
Nov 5-7 50 29
Oct 29-31 49 27
Oct 22-24 49 27
Oct 15-17 51 27
Oct 8-10 52 26
Oct 1-3 52 27

NOTE: 

2005 Data Based Upon Interviews with American Adults

2004 Data Based Upon Interviews with Likely Voters

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Copyright © 2005 Rasmussen Reports