Democrats: Bring Troops Home Next Year

In a direct challenge to President Bush, House Democrats unveiled legislation Thursday requiring the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraq by the fall of next year.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the deadline would be added to legislation providing nearly $100 billion the Bush administration has requested for fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Senior officials said the president will veto any bill setting a deadline for withdrawal from Iraq, CBS News White House correspondent Mark Knoller reports.

Pelosi told reporters the measure would mark the first time the new Democratic-controlled Congress has established a "date certain" for the end of U.S. combat in the four-year-old war that has claimed the lives of more than 3,100 U.S. troops.

Senior White House adviser Dan Bartlett, accompanying Mr. Bush on a flight to Latin America, told reporters, "It's safe to say it's a nonstarter for the president."

Within an hour of Pelosi's news conference, House Republican Leader John Boehner attacked the measure. He said Democrats were proposing legislation that amounted to "establishing and telegraphing to our enemy a timetable" that would result in failure of the U.S. military mission in Iraq.

"Gen. (David) Petraeus should be the one making the decisions on what happens on the ground in Iraq, not Nancy Pelosi or John Murtha," the Ohio Republican added. Murtha, a Pennsylvania Democrat, has been heavily involved in crafting legislation designed to end U.S., participation in the war.

According to an explanation of the measure distributed by Democratic aides, the timetable for withdrawal would be accelerated if the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki did not meet goals for providing for Iraq's security.

Democrats won control of Congress last fall in midterm elections shadowed by public opposition to the war, and have vowed since taking power to challenge Mr. Bush's policies.

Pelosi made her announcement as Senate Democrats reviewed a different approach — a measure that would set a goal of a troop withdrawal by March 2008. Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada called a closed-door meeting of the rank-and-file to consider the measure.

In the House, Pelosi and the leadership have struggled in recent days to come up with an approach on the war that would satisfy liberals reluctant to vote for continued funding without driving away more moderate Democrats unwilling to be seen as tying the hands of military commanders.

The decision to impose conditions on the war risks a major confrontation with the Bush administration and its Republican allies in Congress.

But without a unified party, the Democratic leadership faced the possibility of a highly embarrassing defeat when the spending legislation reaches a vote, likely later this month. establishing a deadline for troop withdrawals.

Talking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Bartlett called it "a political compromise in the Democratic caucus of the House aimed at bringing comity to their internal politics, not reflective of the conditions on the ground in Iraq."

"It would unnecessarily handcuff our generals on the ground, he said. "Obviously, the administration would vehemently oppose and ultimately veto any legislation that looks like what was described today."

A National Security Council spokesman accused the Democrats of using "political calculations" rather than listening to the commanders in Iraq. Spokesman Gordon Johndroe told reporters the Democrats' plan to set a withdrawal date "runs counter to" the latest national intelligence estimates of the consequences of a U.S. withdrawal, CBS News correspondent Peter Maer reports.

To make the overall measure more attractive politically, Democrats also intend to add $1.2 billion to Mr. Bush's request for military operations in Afghanistan, where the Taliban is expected to mount a spring offensive.

CBS News correspondent Bob Fuss reports the bill also includes a prohibition of any war against Iran unless Congress approves it first, a bar against torture, and more money for military and veterans' health care than the administration asked for.

As described by Democrats, the legislation will require Mr. Bush to certify by July 1 and again by Oct. 1. whether the Iraqi government is making progress toward providing for the country's security, allocating its oil revenues and creating a fair system for amending its constitution.

They said if Mr. Bush certified the Iraqis were meeting these so-called benchmarks, U.S. combat troops would have to begin withdrawing by March 1, 2008, and complete the redeployment by Sept. 1.

Otherwise, the deadlines would move up.

If Mr. Bush cannot make the required certification by July 1, troops must begin a six-month withdrawal immediately. If he cannot make the second certification, the same six-month timetable would apply.

The legislation also requires the Pentagon to adhere to its existing standards for equipping and training U.S. troops sent overseas and for providing time at home between tours of combat.

Pelosi said the provision was designed to make sure the government would "not be sending our troops into battle without the proper training, the proper equipment."

Yet it also permits Mr. Bush to issue waivers of these standards. Democrats described the waiver provision as an attempt to embarrass the president into adhering to the standards. But they concede the overall effect would be to permit the administration to proceed with plans to deploy five additional combat brigades to the Baghdad area over the next few months.

The measure emerged from days of private talks among Democrats following the collapse of Murtha's original proposal, which would have required the Pentagon to meet readiness and training standards without the possibility of a waiver.

Murtha, chairman of a House Appropriations military subcommittee, said its implementation would have starved the war effort of troops because the Pentagon would not have been able to find enough fully rested, trained and equipped units to meet its needs.

However, several moderate Democrats spoke out against it, and Republicans sharply attacked it as the abandonment of troops already in the war zone.