Forget the National Intelligence Estimate, the $15 million ad campaign, the much-awaited Petraeus report, and the slick new White House PR offensive. Here are 14 words that matter more than all of that put together -- a sentence that just might end a war: "I say to the president, with great respect, consider that you initiate the withdrawal," said Sen. John Warner, R-Va.
The simple statement from the courtliest of senators (and a veteran, a former Navy secretary, and former chairman of the Armed Services Committee) sent a jolt from Capitol Hill to the White House and beyond -- and reorders the politics of the Iraq war. For President Bush, it makes the calls for a change in strategy impossible to ignore. For Republicans in Congress, it provides all the cover they need to vote the way their constituents are increasingly demanding. And for Democrats, Warner is a powerful example of a hawk whose patience has run out.
"Warner's declaration . . . roiled the political environment ahead of a much-anticipated progress report to be delivered Sept. 11 by Army Gen. David H. Petraeus," write Peter Baker and Jonathan Weisman of The Washington Post. "Democratic and Republican leadership aides said last night that Warner's new stance, coupled with the intelligence assessment, may have stalled any political momentum Bush seemed to have been building in recent days."
"It was a stunning announcement that could have a powerful effect on the war," ABC's Martha Raddatz reported on "Good Morning America." "His pointed message to President Bush will clearly influence others on the Hill."
Warner's suggestion directly undercuts the administration's strategy -- endorsed anew by the president this week -- and adds weight to those who are arguing that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki must go. Said Warner, "We simply cannot, as a nation, stand and put our troops at continuous risk of loss of life and limb, without beginning to take some decisive action which will get everybody's attention."
Add to this the growing questions about the viability of maintaining well more than 100,000 troops in Iraq -- worries apparently shared by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The Los Angeles Times' Julian E. Barnes and Peter Spiegel report that Gen. Peter Pace "is likely to convey concerns" that keeping high troop levels through 2008 "will severely strain the military." "The position of Pace and the Joint Chiefs could add weight to that of Bush administration critics, including Democratic presidential candidates, that the U.S. force should be reduced," they write.