Washington – Senate Democrats impatient to start withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq will inject a new political dynamic into the debate over the war beginning today as they question the military’s top Middle East commander for the first time since their party swept congressional elections last week.
Army Gen. John Abizaid, head of U.S. Central Command, which oversees American forces in the Middle East, will face questions on the violence in Iraq and what it means for the roughly 145,000 U.S. troops there during scheduled testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, senators from both parties said.
Senior Democrats and Republicans on the committee are deeply divided over basic issues such as troop levels, strategy and whether Iraq is already in a state of civil war.
Still, they are united by a concern for American forces.
Committee chairman John Warner, R-Va., for example, said he will quiz Abizaid on the risks U.S. troops could face embedded with Iraqi units under an Iraqi chain of command.
“We’ve got to be very careful we are not putting at risk life and limb of American forces by putting them with Iraqis,” he said.
“What kind of orders will the Iraqi forces receive?” he said, voicing concern over sectarian influences within the Iraqi military.
Democrats have made it clear they intend to bolster the committee’s oversight role, and an influx of new members, including Democrat James Webb of Virginia, is expected to further invigorate debate.
Webb, a former active-duty Marine and one of only a handful of members of Congress with offspring serving in Iraq, secured a seat on the committee Tuesday, according to his spokeswoman, Kristian Denny Todd.
The committee plans to hold confirmation hearings on Dec. 4 or 5 for Robert Gates, the ex-CIA chief who is President Bush’s nominee to replace Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld following Rumsfeld’s resignation the day after the Nov. 7 midterm elections.
It will also weigh in on recommendations by the congressionally mandated Iraq Study Group as well as a sweeping review of Iraq strategy initiated by Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The Pace review will cover strategy, the viability of increasing or decreasing troop levels in Iraq and stress on the force, according to Warner.
Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., poised to take over as committee chairman, said Iraq is headed into an abyss of civil war, and only by beginning a troop pullout in four to six months can Washington exert the necessary pressure on Iraqi leaders to forge political solutions to the country’s violence.
“What (Iraqis) … need to hear, and what the American people need to hear, is that we are darned impatient,” Levin said in a news conference Monday, recounting a conversation with President Bush.
Levin said he believes a majority of the Senate, or 51 members, would now back a bipartisan resolution he initiated on a phased pullout.
