House report proposes troop withdrawal plan

WASHINGTON -- A new congressional report lays out a step-by-step argument for withdrawing ''the vast majority" of American troops from Iraq within 12 to 18 months, adding to a growing chorus of members of both parties for President Bush to abort the occupation.

The report, scheduled to be released Tuesday, was drafted by Representative Martin T. Meehan, a Lowell Democrat and senior member of the oversight panel. The plan calls for reducing the American troop presence in Iraq from 150,000 to as few as 30,000 by the middle of next year.

Such a timetable, if adopted, would make it more urgent for a new Iraqi government to take over most security functions and also send a clear message that the overwhelming US presence -- now seen by many officials and military specialists as counterproductive -- will soon recede, according to the proposal by Meehan, who recently returned from a fact-finding mission to Iraq.

''The open-ended presence of US forces has likely done more to inflame the insurgency than defeat it," concludes the 38-page report entitled, ''Iraq: Light at the End of the Tunnel," a copy of which was provided to the Globe. ''Suspicion about our motives undermines the leaders who cooperate with us and endangers average Iraqis who are seen as participating in institutions that are linked to the occupation."

Two weeks ago, former secretary of state James A. Baker became the latest member of the Republican foreign policy establishment to call for a phased withdrawal of US troops after the scheduled Jan. 30 Iraqi elections. An Edward N. Luttwak, an intellectual guru to many of the Bush administration's proponents of war, has written an article for the latest issue of the influential Foreign Affairs magazine headlined, ''Withdraw Now."

Those comments brought the prominent conservative thinkers in line with a position taken by many Democrats. ''There is a growing realization that we are not succeeding in Iraq and that with each new turning point, we find things only get worse," said Ivo Daalder, a former senior director on the National Security Council during the Clinton administration. ''The violence and number of casualties is going up. There is widespread consensus that the American presence is hurting as much as helping. Therefore a reduction over time is necessary for there to be any chance for Iraq to stand on its own feet."

According to United Nations resolutions, the mandate for Multinational Forces-Iraq officially ends when a constitutional government is in place -- now set to occur Dec. 31 -- unless the new Iraqi government requests that the foreign troops remain. US intelligence officials are predicting that if a stable Iraqi government emerges, Iraq will probably ask the United States to leave after that date. ''The Meehan proposal is where a lot of people will be, including the administration," within three to six months, predicted Daalder, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington. He thinks a pullout even sooner than Meehan is suggesting is possible. ''I think it is much more likely there is zero troops by the end of 2005 than 150,000," he said.

The administration remains reluctant to put a timetable on reducing the number of US troops in Iraq, saying it would only embolden insurgents who could bide their time until the United States leaves. That position was reiterated this week by Condoleezza Rice, Bush's secretary of state nominee, during her confirmation hearings.

But Democrats and a steady number of Republican foreign policy specialists have begun to question whether the open-ended American deployment in Iraq is breeding more anti-Americanism and stifling the chances of Iraqi authorities to gain the legitimacy many see as the best defense against former Saddam Hussein loyalists and foreign terrorists who have been on a bombing and assassination campaign against Iraqis accused of colluding with Americans.

In a speech Jan. 14 at Rice University, Baker said, ''Any appearance of a permanent occupation will both undermine domestic support here in the United States and play directly into the hands of those in the Middle East who, however wrongly, suspect us of imperial design."

Richard Perle, a senior Pentagon adviser and one of the most vocal proponents of the war in Iraq, has said in recent interviews that the biggest mistake was to retain a large occupation force immediately after Hussein was toppled in March 2003. An interim government should have been cobbled together immediately and handed full political control, with a relatively small number of US support troops remaining in the country for a considerable length of time, Perle said. He did not address how a government assembled by foreign nations would have been seen as legitimate through Iraqi eyes.

Perle and Baker join several other Republicans calling for a phased withdrawal from Iraq. Among them is Luttwak, a longtime global strategist and Pentagon adviser, whose article appears in the January-February issue of Foreign Affairs.

''Given all that has happened in Iraq to date, the best strategy for the United States is disengagement," he wrote. ''This would call for the careful planning and scheduling of the withdrawal of US forces from much of the country -- while making due provisions for sharp punitive strikes against any attempt to harass the withdrawing forces. But it would primarily require an intense diplomatic effort, to prepare and conduct parallel negotiations with several parties inside Iraq and out. All have much to lose or gain depending on exactly how the US withdrawal is carried out, and this would give Washington a great deal of leverage that could be used to advance US interests."

The proposal by Meehan, who voted against the war in October 2002, comes as the administration prepares to ask Congress for another installment of as much as $100 billion to fund the occupation. While the report is not expected to be embraced by the White House or enlist many Republican backers in the GOP-controlled Congress, it argues that with vastly fewer troops, US goals can still be achieved in a conflict than has claimed more than 1,300 US lives and wounded more than 10,000 Americans.

''At this point in time, the risks of a phased withdrawal are lower than the risks associated with an indefinite occupation," Meehan's white paper says.

''If we hope to change perceptions at the local level, encourage international cooperation, and stop the insurgency, the United States must fundamentally recast its role in Iraq."

The proposal calls for drawing down over time to between 30,000 and 50,000 troops, in conjunction with a ''realistic plan" to get there.

That would include protecting American units as they move out of highly populated areas and assume a lower profile; guarding likely flash points for civil war, such as the oil-rich area surrounding Kirkuk; and securing Iraq's borders and weapons sites, a virtual ''bonanza" for insurgents.

But ultimately, none of this would work without making the training of Iraqi security forces ''the number one priority of the United States government in Iraq" and giving priority to reconstruction projects ''with an immediate impact on [Iraqi] employment," according to the report.

Bryan Bender can be reached at bender@globe.com.