House rebukes Bush on troop surge plan

WASHINGTON -- The House of Representatives delivered a harsh though symbolic rebuke to President Bush's Iraq war strategy yesterday, escalating a confrontation that Democratic congressional leaders hope will force the president to end the widely unpopular war.

Seventeen Republicans joined all but two House Democrats to vote for the resolution disapproving of Bush's decision to send more than 20,000 additional troops to Iraq. The vote is the first time Congress has gone on record opposing the way the president is conducting the war in Iraq.

Democrats suggested that the nonbinding resolution is the first volley in what will be a campaign to change the war's course, and they vowed to follow it with more substantive steps if the president refuses to listen.

"The passage of this legislation will signal a change in direction in Iraq that will end the fighting and bring our troops home," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, declared yesterday. It "should send a very clear and firm message to the president of the United States that the American people spoke in November, that they wanted a new direction in Iraq."

The three-sentence resolution doesn't require action and makes just two simple points: that the public and Congress "will continue to support and protect" US troops and that Congress "disapproves" of the president's decision to send additional troops to Iraq. In January, Bush announced he would send 21,500 more troops to Iraq to quell sectarian violence there.

But the true weight of the resolution is in what it suggests for the future.

As liberal voices urge Democrats to take bolder steps to bring the troops home, party leaders say they are already preparing more aggressive ways to challenge Bush over the war. And though they started with the resolution, Democratic lawmakers may move toward using the power of the purse.

Representative John P. Murtha, a Pennsylvania Democrat and Vietnam combat veteran who chairs the Defense Appropriations subcommittee, is drafting a measure that would put strict limits on the way the administration can spend federal money allocated for the war. The legislation, Murtha said, is intended to force the president to reverse the troop "surge" by restricting the funding he can use for it.

"This country needs a dramatic change of course in Iraq, and it is the responsibility of this Congress to consummate that change," he said.

Hoping to build on the momentum from yesterday's vote, Senate Democrats are to convene today for a rare weekend vote that would allow the Senate to begin debate on a resolution similar to the one passed in the House yesterday.

Last week, Senate Republicans blocked debate on a similar resolution because they wanted to be able to offer their own alternatives.

Democratic leaders said yesterday that they were confident the logjam would be broken today, but Republicans predicted that they can derail the debate again.

White House Press Secretary Tony Snow yesterday repeated the president's position that simple resolutions won't sway him, and warned that Bush would "take a dim view" of anything that seeks to dictate the course of the war by limiting the president's spending flexibility.

"This is a nonbinding resolution," Snow said, "but what we're afraid of is that this is, in fact, going to serve as a precursor for cutting off [money for] our troops."

House Republicans argued against the resolution by saying alternately that the nonbinding measure is meaningless because it doesn't force Bush or anyone else to do anything and that it will harm troops' morale by formally recording congressional opposition to the war they are fighting.

Several Republicans said the resolution foreshadows the Democrats' ultimate plan to financially starve the war, the most extreme step Congress can take to end it and something that only a small number of Democrats in the House and Senate favor.

"The real Democratic plan is coming later," said Representative Phil Gingrey, a Georgia Republican. "This resolution is not meaningless. It is the first step, my colleagues, toward cutting off funding for our troops and pulling the rug out from under them."

Representative Vito J. Fossella, a New York Republican, warned that the resolution signals that the United States has lost its resolve in the war on terrorism. He spoke on the House floor in front of a poster featuring pictures of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"Although this resolution is nonbinding, the message it sends to our troops on the battlefield and to our enemies is crystal clear," Fossella said. "Our words have consequences as powerful as our actions."

But Republicans' once rock-solid support for the war crumbled with yesterday's vote.

Three months after a congressional election in which voters registered their anger over the war by sweeping Democrats into power, some rank-and-file Republicans said they could no longer stand behind what they believe is a failing strategy.

"Interjecting more young American troops into the crosshairs of an Iraqi civil war is simply not the right approach," said Representative Richard Keller, a Florida Republican. "Three years ago, I could have voted for this 'surge,' but the situation on the ground in Iraq today is very different than it was three years ago."

Though the House resolution debate centered on Bush's use of more force, both Democrats and Republicans used it for a debate over the war in general.

Before the vote, House leaders allowed any member to speak for five minutes on the floor. Nearly 400 of 435 members did so over four days, by far the most extensive debate since the United States invaded Iraq four years ago.

Democrats reserved particular condemnation for the president's decision to send more troops, even though many contend that Iraq is the grips of civil war.

"Packing more troops into the narrow streets of Baghdad will be a disaster," said Representative Stephen F. Lynch, a South Boston Democrat who voted to authorize the war in 2002.

Democratic leaders chose to use a nonbinding resolution as their opening move in order to draw as much support as possible for a bill that opposes the president on the war.

But they will be hard-pressed to replicate yesterday's bipartisan vote as they move to more aggressive measures intended to force Bush's hand.

Though some liberal members of the party want to immediately shut down funding for the war, the vast majority of Democrats aren't in favor of the move. The party is split over its strategy; some proposals under consideration include hard limits on the number of troops, rescinding the 2002 war resolution, and attaching conditions to future war-related spending bills.

Republicans will be united in opposition to anything they believe could shortchange the troops, said House minority whip Roy Blunt, a Missouri Republican.

GOP leaders said only 17 Republicans crossed party lines to vote with Democrats on the resolution, far fewer than the 50 or 60 members Democrats thought might join them from the other side of the aisle.

"Our conference will be united in a significant way on the issue of funding the troops," Blunt said.

Nevertheless, Democrats applauded their party's unity and the Republicans who joined them to send unmistakable messages to the president.

"We support the troops completely, wholeheartedly, now and in the future," said Ike Skelton, a Missouri Democrat and chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. "The president's plan to deploy more troops is simply not the answer."