US:The Bush administration is considering a series of major policy changes over Iraq that were set out by the outgoing defence secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, in a secret memo he sent to the White House, it was confirmed yesterday.
Stephen Hadley, the Bush administration's national security adviser, said in a TV interview that the president was open to all ideas and had invited Mr Rumsfeld - who sent the memo two days before his resignation - along with other interested parties to contribute to a policy review.
In an extraordinary shift in tone from the architect of the "stay the course" policy, Mr Rumsfeld proposed a sharp reduction in US bases in Iraq. Mr Hadley said an eventual withdrawal was desirable, but reiterated the official line that there would be no quitting before the Iraqi government was ready to take over security.
"At some point obviously, we would like to begin bringing troops back home. The president has said, 'As Iraqis stand up, we can stand down'," he said.
The Rumsfeld memo has emerged at the start of a crucial week for the Bush administration in its stance over Iraq. On Wednesday the Iraq Study Group, a bipartisan commission led by the former secretary of state James Baker, will give its recommendations on the future conduct of the war. Today the president will meet the Shia leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim to try to persuade him to back the Iraqi government of Nouri al-Maliki.
In the memo, leaked to the New York Times, Mr Rumsfeld admitted that the US mission in Iraq "is not working well enough or fast enough". He proposed "major adjustments", listing 15 ways in which the approach could be improved.
Mr Rumsfeld floated the idea of reducing US bases in Iraq from 55 to 15 by April 2007 and five by July. American troops would be withdrawn from "vulnerable positions" such as cities and moved to safe places in Iraq and Kuwait from where they could act as "quick reaction forces".
Iraqi security forces would be boosted, through increased use of US trainers and by beefing up Iraqi ministries. Adopting the language of the classroom, Mr Rumsfeld said a modest withdrawal of US forces would show the Iraqis "they have to pull up their socks". It would be tantamount to "taking our hand off the bicycle seat".
He talked of the need to stop "rewarding bad behaviour" by no longer focusing reconstruction funds on violent areas.
There was speculation yesterday about the nature of the memo, which was written a day before the mid-term elections. Some commentators saw it as a last-ditch effort to keep his job. He is to be replaced in the new year by the former director of the CIA Robert Gates.
But the US ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, said the memo had been invited as part of a broad review. "It's a good thing. It's energising to review and adjust and the secretary of defence was offering his own ideas." Democratic senator Evan Bayh, who will this week launch an official bid for president in 2008, told ABC television that his preferred policy would be to bring out a "small group" of US troops within the next few months to let the Iraqi government and Mr Maliki know the process of withdrawal was under way.
The swirl of positioning ahead of the publication of the Baker report came amid further grim news from Iraq. The US military admitted it had killed two women and a child during attacks on buildings it said were being used by insurgents in Anbar province. Six militants died in the raid, the Pentagon said. On Saturday three US soldiers were killed by bombs in Anbar province and near Taji, and 53 civilians died in a car bombing in Baghdad.