Washington – President Bush accused congressional Democrats today of meddling in Iraq war policy and said setting a deadline for a pull-out of U.S. forces would have disastrous repercussions for both Iraq and America.
The Senate resumes debate today on a bill containing a spring 2008 timetable for bringing American troops home. Democrats insist that Bush will have to accept some sort of withdrawal deadline in exchange for the billions of dollars needed to fund the war.
“We would hope that the president understands how serious we are,” Majority Leader Harry Reid said after the Senate voted to uphold a timeline proposal in a war spending bill.
But Bush said today that their move will not prompt him to negotiate. He said again that he would veto any funding legislation that includes a withdrawal timeline.
“The consequences of imposing such a specific and random date of withdrawal would be disastrous,” Bush said in a speech at the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association meeting. “Our enemies in Iraq would simply have to mark their calendars. They’d spend the months ahead plotting how to use their new safe haven once we were to leave. It makes no sense for politicians in Washington, D.C. to be dictating arbitrary timelines for our military commanders in a war zone 6,000 miles away.”
