Amid a growing Republican revolt over Iraq at the start of a two-week Senate debate on the war, the White House has denied that President George Bush is considering a withdrawal of American troops "right now".
Citing administration officials, the New York Times reported yesterday that the White House fears Senate Republican support for Mr Bush's Iraq strategy is collapsing and that some officials are urging the president to announce his intention of withdrawing US troops from Baghdad and other cities.
White House spokesman Tony Snow played down Republican discontent with the president's conduct of the war and said that any withdrawal would be determined by military conditions in Iraq rather than political circumstances in Washington. "There is no debate right now on withdrawing forces right now from Iraq."
Iraq's foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, warned that a swift US military withdrawal from the country could lead to a full-scale civil war, the collapse of the government and new conflicts across the region.
"We have held discussion with members of Congress and explained to them the dangers of a quick pull-out and leaving a security vacuum. The dangers could be a civil war, dividing the country, regional wars and the collapse of the state."
Democratic leaders plan to use the debate on the 2008 Pentagon budget to schedule a series of votes on Iraq, forcing Republicans to back the president's unpopular strategy or vote to change it.
"It is going to be harder for Republicans to not sign on to something with bite in it, a clear Congressional assessment that change is needed. I think it is more likely there will be a majority around here that say we should begin to redeploy some forces by a certain date, and I hope it would be a larger majority," said Armed Services Committee chairman Carl Levin.
Emboldened by the defection of some of the president's key Republican allies, who were joined by three more senators in the past few days, Democrats hope to force votes on withdrawing troops and cutting off spending for the war. One proposal calls for a troop withdrawal to begin within three months and another would cut off spending for most combat operations from early next year.
Hillary Clinton is co-sponsoring a proposal that would rescind the Senate's 2002 authorisation for the war - which she supported - but would allow some US troops to remain in Iraq. It would require the president to seek a new authorisation for the war, forcing him to spell out the mission, strategy, and goals of the US presence there.
"The [ 2002] authorisation, which references the government of Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction, is no longer relevant. The American public and our troops in the field are entitled to a new debate about this war," Mrs Clinton and West Virginia's Robert Byrd wrote in a letter to colleagues.
Most of these proposals are unlikely to win the support of the 60 senators needed to proceed to a vote but Democrats believe that growing pressure on Republicans will eventually persuade more of them to abandon Mr Bush.
Republican rebels are coalescing around a bipartisan plan to give legislative force to last December's recommendations of the Iraq Study Group, which called for most US combat forces to withdraw from Iraq by March 2008. The report also called for direct talks with all of Iraq's neighbours, including Iran and Syria.
Mr Snow yesterday sought to lower expectations about a report due next Sunday on whether the Iraqi government is meeting political, economic and security benchmarks that Mr Bush set in January.
"You are not going to expect all the benchmarks to be met at the beginning of something. You are hoping that you are going to be able to see progress in terms of meeting benchmarks from that beginning stage to what you see in two months," Mr Snow said.