Bush: 'US will leave Iraq when asked'

US troops will be withdrawn from Iraq at the request of the newly-elected government, President George Bush said today.

But Mr Bush said he was confident Iraq’s new leaders will want the US military to remain in place, helping to stem the bloody upsurge of continued violence.

“I’ve heard the voices of the people that presumably will be in a position of responsibility after these elections, although you never know,” he told the New York Times newspaper.

“But it seems like most of the leadership there understands that there will be a need for coalition troops at least until Iraqis are able to fight.”

Asked specifically whether, as a matter of principle, the US would pull out of Iraq if asked to do so by its new leaders, President Bush was crystal clear.

“Absolutely. This is a sovereign government. They’re on their feet.”

The official number of US soldiers in Iraq recently edged up to around 150,000 as the army prepares for violence surrounding Sunday’s elections.

The Pentagon this week announced plans to keep at least 120,000 US troops in Iraq over the next two years.

But it is as helpers, not occupiers, that President Bush is keen the troops are viewed by Iraqi citizens.

“To the extent that a coalition presence is viewed as an occupying force, it enables the insurgents, the radicals, to continue to impress people that the government really is not their government, and that the government is complicit in having their country occupied,” he said.

“I view that as reasonable. I also view that as pretty hopeful that there’s kind of a nationalistic sentiment that says, ‘This is my country’, I mean, to me that’s a positive sign.”

Mr Bush noted “a certain realism amongst the leadership” which is aware “there’s much more work to do before we’re ready to move out on our own.”

He said British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s recent proposal to transfer calmer parts of the country entirely into the hands of Iraqi troops was “certainly one option” although the pair had not discussed it.

He rejected the suggestion that relations with Europe had soured since the Iraq invasion, but acknowledged that there was an “obvious disagreement”.

President Bush spoke of the Iraqi elections in the context of a broader plan for spreading democracy in the Middle East.

“I think two of the great ironies of history will be that there will be a Palestinian state and a democratic Iraq showing the way forward for people who desperately want to be free,” he said.

On the forthcoming elections, he repeated his favoured message: “We’re watching history being made, history that will change the world.”