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Bush OKs 'Horizon' To Withdraw From Iraq

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By STEVEN LEE MYERS

The New York Times

Published: July 19, 2008

HOUSTON - President Bush agreed to "a general time horizon" for withdrawing American troops in Iraq, the White House said Friday, in a concession that reflected both progress in stabilizing Iraq and the depth of political opposition to an open-ended military presence in Iraq and at home.

Bush, who long has derided timetables for troop withdrawals as dangerous, agreed to at least a notional one as part of the administration's efforts to negotiate the terms for an American military presence in Iraq after a U.N. mandate expires at the end of the year.

The agreement, announced in coordinated statements released Friday by the White House and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government, reflected a significant shift in the war in Iraq. More than five years after the conflict began with the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the American military presence now depends significantly, if not completely, on Iraqi acquiescence.

The White House offered no specifics about how far off any "time horizon" would be, with officials saying details remained to be negotiated.

Any dates cited in an agreement would be cast as goals for handing responsibility to Iraqis, and not specifically for reducing American troops, said White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe.

But the White House statement said the two leaders "agreed that improving conditions should allow for the agreements now under negotiation to include a general time horizon for meeting aspirational goals such as the resumption of Iraqi security control in their cities and provinces and the further reduction of U.S. combat forces from Iraq."

The announcement could alter the American political debate over the war in Iraq and how best to end it now that even Bush is willing to speak of an end to the American presence.

It came on the eve of a trip to Iraq and Afghanistan by presumptive Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama, who has vowed to pursue a strict phased timetable for withdrawing most combat troops from Iraq over 16 months beginning next year. He has cited Iraq's eagerness for a timetable as support for his strategy.

Obama spokesman Bill Burton called the announcement "a step in the right direction," but derided what he called the vagueness of the White House commitment.

Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential candidate, praised the agreement as evidence that Bush's strategy of sending additional forces last year had worked, and he sought to use it as a cudgel against Obama.

"An artificial timetable based on political expediency would have led to disaster and could still turn success into defeat," McCain said.

Bush and his aides, traveling in Tucson, Ariz., and Houston to attend Republican fundraisers, insisted again that the administration was not accepting any timetable for withdrawing American forces, which now total roughly 140,000.

But the administration has faced increasing resistance from a newly confident Iraq, where some officials have said publicly that Iraq can take charge of much of its security by 2009, and be able to operate without American help by 2012.

Under pressure from political parties wanting a diminishing American role, al-Maliki began demanding something in the agreement that would make it clear that American troops were on the way out.

Iraq's statement on Friday reflected those internal sensitivities; it referred more specifically than the American version to "a time frame for the complete transfer of the security responsibilities to the hands of the Iraqi security as preface to decrease the number of the American forces and withdraw them later from Iraq."

In Baghdad, a senior member of al-Maliki's Dawa Party, Ali al-Adeeb, said that the withdrawal of American and other foreign forces was fundamental to any agreement.

"The Iraqi government considers the determination of a specific date for the withdrawal of foreign forces an important issue to deal with," he said. "I don't know what the American side thinks, but we consider it the core of the subject."

Al-Adeeb suggested that a final agreement was not imminent, but White House aides said they were confident one would be reached by the end of the month.

"We're converging on an agreement," an administration official said, noting that negotiators continued to hammer out provisions involving security matters. Those include command of military operations, legal immunities for civilian contractors and the authority to detain prisoners.

On the prospect of dates for American withdrawals, the White House spokesman said that the agreement would not prescribe American troop levels over time but rather reflect a transition to Iraqi command.

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