US House calls for plan to pull forces from Iraq

Reuters

In a rare show of bipartisanship on Iraq, the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday voted to make the Pentagon produce plans to withdraw U.S. troops -- but did not mandate the withdrawals.

Some House Democrats went much further than that vote, however and warned they would hold try to hold up President George W. Bush's latest war funding request until he agrees to a goal of ending combat operations in Iraq by the time he leaves office in early 2009.


The chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Wisconsin Democratic Rep. David Obey, said his panel would not even consider the funding request -- which Pentagon chief Robert Gates says will be about $189 billion -- until early next year.

The legislation that passed the House 377-46, gathering votes from nearly as many Republicans as Democrats, would require the Pentagon to submit regular reports on withdrawal planning to Congress' defense committees.......