After secretive Iraq detour, Bush heads to Australia summit
ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE (AFP) — President George W. Bush, escaping the political hothouse of Washington, was en route to Australia after dropping hints of a potential reduction in US troops during a surprise trip to Iraq.
Monday's secretive detour that took Bush to a desert airbase in the long-restive province of Anbar came as a showdown looms in Congress over the deeply unpopular war, more than four years after US-led forces invaded Iraq.
Bush, under intense pressure to start pulling US troops out of the bloody conflict, indicated that a drawdown could be in the offing as former Sunni insurgents join with US forces to fight Al-Qaeda extremists in Anbar.
In a briefing at the Al-Asad airbase, Bush said he was told by US commander General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker that "if the kind of success we are now seeing (in Anbar) continues, it is possible to maintain the same level of security with fewer American forces."
The president, however, gave no indication of a timeframe or number for the possible scaling back in combat troops.
Bush convened a meeting of his "war council" with Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and other Iraqi leaders just days before Petraeus and Crocker report to Congress on the progress of the president's military "surge" strategy.
Travelling to Anbar rather than Baghdad gave Bush an opportunity to highlight the shift in sentiment in the province, which US officials insist is being replicated in other strife-torn parts of Iraq.
Top US officials on hand for Bush's meetings in Iraq included Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and national security adviser Stephen Hadley.
Interviewed by ABC News, Gates said Bush would reach a decision on US troop levels in Iraq "fairly shortly," after the congressional testimony of Petraeus and Crocker next week.
Surveying Iraq overall, Donald Rumsfeld's successor as Pentagon chief added: "Actually, I am more optimistic than I have been at any time since I took this job."
The White House is to make a formal report to the Democratic-led Congress by September 15 aimed at persuading lawmakers to continue funding the Iraq war, which has killed more than 3,700 US troops.
Bush's trip to Iraq coincided with the withdrawal of British troops from their last base in the southern city of Basra amid tensions between Washington and its top ally Britain over their policy in Iraq.
General Sir Mike Jackson, the head of the British army during the invasion, on Saturday branded the Bush administration's post-invasion policy "intellectually bankrupt."
But in an address to raucously cheering Marines at the base, Bush reiterated his controversial stand that the war in Iraq is a life-or-death struggle against Al-Qaeda extremists, as he vowed to stand firm against Congress.
"Those decisions will be based on a calm assessment by our military commanders on the conditions on the ground, not a nervous reaction by Washington politicians to poll results in the media," the president said.
"In other words, when we begin to draw down troops from Iraq, it will be from a position of strength and success, not from the position of fear and failure."
From the heat and dust of Iraq, Bush was flying aboard Air Force One to Sydney for a summit of Asia-Pacific leaders.
"Even though this will be a very hot political season in Washington, this president is committed to this region," Dennis Wilder, the National Security Council's senior Asia director, said ahead of the trip.
"Our economic future is tied to this region. Our security future is tied to this region."
Still, Bush is to cut short his attendance at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit to return next Sunday to Washington, in time for the hotly awaited appearances in Congress of Petraeus and Crocker.
