Petraeus may have bought Bush more time

By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Gen. David Petraeus' report of progress in Iraq may have bought George W. Bush more time to pursue the war while blunting Democrats' immediate hopes of imposing a timetable for a U.S. pullout.

Anticipation by Democrats that the Petraeus report would prompt a sea change in policy have dissipated, even as Americans overwhelmingly tell pollsters they are ready for the troops to come home.

Republicans, too, are signaling their increasing impatience with Iraq and the absence of progress on political reconciliation there among warring factions.

Still, there was no sign yet of a dramatic erosion in Republican ranks that would give Democrats who hold a slim majority in the U.S. Congress enough votes to force Bush to shift course.

"Basically what's happened is the administration did just enough to stem the hemorrhaging of support on the Republican side of the aisle," said Thomas Mann, a congressional expert at the Brookings Institution.

Petraeus, in two days of congressional testimony this week, said the deployment of 30,000 more troops has made sufficient progress that these forces can be pulled out by next summer.

Democrats are under strong pressure from the anti-war left to try to force a full U.S. withdrawal from Iraq, particularly by including pullout conditions in a defense spending bill.

The liberal group MoveOn.org created a firestorm by publishing a full-page advertisement in The New York Times on Monday calling Petraeus "General Betray Us" and accusing him of "cooking the books for the White House."

Mann said the ad was "as counter-productive as one can imagine" because it forced Democrats to treat Petraeus more gently than they otherwise might have.

Republicans accused MoveOn.org of taking its criticism too far and tried to link the group to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, and House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat.

"The Democrats and Moveon.org have overshot the runway on Petraeus by being mean, personal and un-American. An interest group now sets the terms of the debate for Speaker Pelosi and Leader Reid," said Republican strategist Scott Reed.

SHORING UP REPUBLICAN SUPPORT

Bush, who talked with leaders of Congress at the White House on Tuesday, is expected to endorse Petraeus' recommendations in a speech to Americans this week.

The development left open the possibility that as many as 130,000 U.S. troops could be in Iraq during the heat of next year's presidential campaign and still be there when the new president takes over in January 2009.

Sen. Gordon Smith, the Oregon Republican who became a critic of the war late last year and said it might be "criminal," said Petraeus had had an impact.