GOP senators challenge Petraeus, Crocker over Iraq policy

By Associated Press

Last update: September 12, 2007 - 12:04 AM

WASHINGTON Senate Republicans sharply challenged President Bush's top military general and ambassador in Iraq on Tuesday in a blatant demonstration of misgivings within the GOP about the protracted war.

"Are we going to continue to invest blood and treasure at the same rate we're doing now? For what?" asked Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., who supports legislation setting a deadline to bring troops home.

The deep-seated doubt expressed at the hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee reflected just how far Congress had come since the war began over four years ago. And Republican senators raised tough questions that rivaled those asked by Democratic presidential hopefuls on the panel.

The exchanges came just a day after the top U.S. war commander, Gen. David Petraeus, recommended keeping the bulk of U.S. forces in Iraq some 130,000 troops deployed there through next summer.

Whereas Republicans were once deferential to the thinking of officials running the war, particularly uniformed officers, Hagel and other GOP senators on the panel said they doubted that simply giving war commanders more time would necessarily yield results.

"In my judgment, some type of success in Iraq is possible, but as policymakers, we should acknowledge that we are facing extraordinarily narrow margins for achieving our goals," said Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana, the top Republican on the committee.

Sen. Norm Coleman said he appreciates plans to return troop levels to 130,000 down from the 168,000 currently in Iraq but that he wants a longer-term vision other than suggestions that Patraeus and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker will return to Capitol Hill in mid-March to give another assessment.

"Americans want to see light at the end of the tunnel," said Coleman, R-Minn.