Bush to announce 8,000 troops to return from Iraq

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080908/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_iraq

By BEN FELLER, Associated Press Writer
41 minutes ago



WASHINGTON - President Bush plans to keep the number of U.S. troops in Iraq near the current level through the end of the year and will pull home about 8,000 U.S. troops by February, when the next president will be in charge of wartime decision-making.



If security in Iraq keeps improving, Bush says, "additional reductions will be possible in the first half of 2009."

The president's decisions amount to perhaps his last major troop strategy in a war that has come to define his presidency.

He was to announce the details in a speech Tuesday, the text of which was released in advance by the White House.