Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid yesterday said Iraqi leaders’ agreement on key measures for national reconciliation would not stop Democrats’ push next month for a U.S. pullout.
“While Sunday’s announcement is a welcome step, it is far short of what is needed to bring about political reconciliation,” Reid spokesman Jim Manley said.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, California Democrat, did not answer questions about Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s progress uniting Shi’ite, Sunni and Kurdish communities because the draft agreement reached Sunday is not finalized.
She vowed to push for a pullout and said “the Maliki government has utterly failed.”
Republicans heralded the Iraqi political breakthrough, which included draft agreements to end the ban on former members of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath Party from jobs in the new government, release some detainees held without charge and enact a law governing provincial powers.
“This consensus is also great news for American support forces in the area, whose continued success on the ground is helping create the conditions for political reconciliation to take place,” said House Minority Whip Roy Blunt, Missouri Republican.
Mr. Reid, Nevada Democrat, has focused on failures of the fledgling Iraqi government after the surge of U.S. troops ordered earlier this year by President Bush improved security in and around Baghdad.
“The president continues to stubbornly pursue a flawed strategy that has mired our troops in a civil war in Iraq and diverted our attention as Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda grow stronger,” Mr. Reid said after Mr. Bush’s speech yesterday to an American Legion convention in Reno, Nev.
The president used the speech to shore up public support for the Iraq mission ahead of a military progress report next month that is expected to be pivotal in the war debate.
“The most important and immediate way to counter the ambitions of al Qaeda and Iran and other forces of instability and terror is to win the fight in Iraq,” he told the convention.
Democrats have started to shift the war debate to Afghanistan to bolster plans for a pullout from Iraq.
Five Senate Democrats, including three presidential candidates, called for the White House to refocus on Afghanistan by convening a bipartisan study group to recommend new policies.
The 2004 Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, is leading the call, with 2008 presidential hopefuls Sens. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware, Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York and Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, as well as Sen. Barbara Boxer of California.
“While some progress has been made, recent reports show that conditions remain grave, and it is clear that we have reached a critical stage in the mission,” the senators said in a letter to Army Lt. Gen. Douglas E. Lute, the administration’s war czar.
A copy of the letter was distributed to the press.
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