Senate Republicans bar Iraq withdrawal plan

By Susan Cornwell and Richard Cowan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senate Republicans on Friday blocked a $50 billion Iraq war bill that included a troop pullout plan, killing the latest Democratic attempt to end the war while keeping up the fight over its funding.

Despite passionate appeals by Democrats, who noted that 2007 had been the deadliest year for U.S. troops in Iraq so far, Republicans stopped the proposal that had passed the House of Representatives on a largely partisan vote on Wednesday.

The measure needed 60 votes to pass under Senate rules; it only got 53 votes, with 45 senators voting against, all but two of them Republicans.

The bill would have given President George W. Bush about a quarter of the $196 billion he wants for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in fiscal 2008, while setting a goal that all U.S. combat soldiers withdraw from Iraq by December 15, 2008.

"What will it take to end this war? How many lives, how many limbs, how many broken families, how many innocent victims?" the Senate's No. 2 Democrat, Dick Durbin of Illinois, asked. Over 850 U.S. soldiers have died this year.

"We know the president will not do this, but it is within our power" to start bringing U.S. troops home, Durbin argued.

Republicans responded that the Pentagon needed the money and this was the wrong time to meddle in Iraq military strategy just when levels of violence there were falling.

Democrats have tried repeatedly to limit the war this year, and Republicans promised to keep blocking their attempts. The narrowly divided Senate, where 60 of 100 votes are often required to advance legislation, has been the graveyard for most efforts.