WASHINGTON (Thomson Financial) - Alabama Republican Senator Jeff Sessions said he and other members of Congress expect the number of US troops in Iraq to be reduced after September, saying a 'surge' in US forces could not be maintained indefinitely.
Sessions, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, told CBS television's 'Face the Nation' that a progress report due in September by the commander of US troops in Iraq would provide a chance to scale back the 147,000-strong US force.
'But by September, when General (David) Petraeus is to make a report, I think most of the people in Congress believe, unless something extraordinary occurs, that we should be on a move to draw those surge numbers down,' Sessions said.
'I don't think we need to be an occupying power. This is a fine line we've walked, and this surge has got to be temporary. We do not need to be and cannot be perceived as just occupying Iraq for any extended period of time,' he said.
Sessions described president George Bush's strategy in Iraq to deploy extra troops as 'a bitter pill' that lawmakers accepted 'because of the violence in the capital city of Baghdad.' tf.TFN-Europe_newsdesk@thomson.com afp/jsa COPYRIGHT Copyright AFX News Limited 2007. All rights reserved. The copying, republication or redistribution of AFX News Content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of AFX News.