WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush is reviewing Iraq strategy with top commanders for a second day in a row as election-season pressure increases to make dramatic changes amid deteriorating conditions. The president was to consult by video conference Saturday with Gen. John Abizaid, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East, and Gen. George Casey, who leads the U.S.-led Multinational Forces in Iraq. Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, were participating as well.
Bush met with Abizaid on Friday at the White House.
Setting the stage for a possible announcement, the White House insisted that all that is in question is a change in tactics, not a strategy overhaul.
The meetings come at the end of a week in which the U.S. military spokesman in Iraq said a stepped-up operation to secure Baghdad was failing and needed to be refocused, Republicans worried about losing ground in the midterm elections expressed fresh doubts about the war, and frustration grew with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's lack of progress in reining in militias.
On Friday, gunmen loyal to an anti-American Shiite cleric briefly seized a major southern city, an embarrassment for the local Iraqi security forces. For October so far, the U.S. death toll was at least 75—and likely to be the highest for any month in nearly two years.
"The last few weeks have been rough for our troops in Iraq, and for the Iraqi people," Bush said Saturday in his weekly radio address. "The fighting is difficult, but our nation has seen difficult fights before. In World War II and the Cold War, earlier generations of Americans sacrificed so that we can live in freedom. This generation will do its duty as well."
Bush said the violence has increased because the Baghdad campaign has put a greater number of American forces in the most violent areas and because terrorists are grasping for propaganda tools. He insisted his goal of victory in Iraq would not change. And he praised Iraq's leaders for "beginning to take the difficult steps necessary to defeat the terrorists and unite their country."
"The terrorists are trying to divide America and break our will, and we must not allow them to succeed," he said. "We will help Iraq become a strong democracy that is a strong ally in the war on terror."
However, Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, who holds a seat deemed safe for the GOP, said in a campaign debate Thursday she would have voted against the war had she known Saddam Hussein possessed no weapons of mass destruction.
Democrats also kept up the pressure. In a letter to the president, a dozen House and Senate Democratic leaders urged him to bring home some U.S. troops and force the Iraqis to take more responsibility for their security. The Democrats said Bush should do more to pressure Iraqi leaders to disarm militias and find a political solution that would curb violence.
Bush called withdrawal a retreat that "would allow the terrorists to gain a new safe haven from which to launch new attacks on America."
"We will not pull our troops off the battlefield before the mission is complete," he said.
