Washington - Senate Republicans on Wednesday blocked what Democrats hoped would be their best bid yet to force the White House to reduce more rapidly the number of troops in Iraq. Democrats garnered only 56 votes in the 100-seat Senate - a majority, but four short of the number needed to shut down a filibuster, the US parliamentary tactic that allows a measure to be literally debated to death.
The military readiness measure was proposed by Senator James Webb, the man whose razor-thin victory in Virginia in November 2006 put Democrats in charge of the Senate.
It called for troops to be given as much time at home as they have spent overseas before being deployed abroad again.
The proposal was part of the annual debate on military issues in the Senate, and was pivotal in Democratic strategy to force the hand of US President George W Bush for a faster drawdown of troops.
Democrats were hopeful for passage for several reasons.
Because the measure focused on the health of the troops instead of micro-managing military strategy, Democrats had collected some support among Republicans.
In addition, Bush appeared last week to have been weakened by rising critical voices among Republicans during the appearance before Congress of the top US commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus.
The tide was reversed Wednesday however after days of strong lobbying by the White House and Pentagon, who convinced borderline Republicans that such a measure would interfere with military strategy, reports said.
Bush said last week he would withdraw the 30,000 extra troops sent since January to quell soaring violence in Iraq, but not until next summer, a move that would still leave 130,000 US troops there.
He also outlined a long-term military commitment to Iraq similar to the half-century-old US role in South Korea.
Webb, a decorated US Marine combat veteran who once served as Navy secretary, referred to the speech in comments quoted by the New York Times after the vote, saying: "You are seeing, as of a week ago, the administration and some of the leading Republicans in here talking about, 'Hey it's OK that we are going to be in Iraq for the next 50 years.' I don't think it is OK."
Senator John Warner, a key Republican on military issues who has broken with Bush over failures in Iraq and who supported a similar Webb measure in July, returned to the party fold Wednesday in the vote.
