Reid says Bush told Iraq war lost cause

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Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid yesterday declared the United States had lost the war in Iraq, a conclusion he said he communicated to President Bush at a meeting Wednesday.

"This war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday," Mr. Reid, Nevada Democrat, said at a Capitol Hill press conference with anti-war state legislators.

Mr. Reid said that both Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates agree with his position, though neither has ever declared defeat.

"You have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows," said Mr. Reid, who left the press conference without fielding follow-up questions.

The White House said no one recalled Mr. Reid saying "the war is lost" at the meeting with the president.

"It's disturbing that some on Capitol Hill believe they know more than the commanders on the ground," said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino, adding that Mr. Reid's assessment was in conflict with senior military advisers conducting the troop surge in Baghdad.

"If this is his true feeling, then it makes one wonder if he has the courage of his convictions and therefore will decide to defund the war," Mrs. Perino said.

Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, this week said a little over half of the 25,000-troop surge he requested has arrived in Baghdad.

Democrats have previously deemed the Iraq mission "hopeless," but few have gone as far as Mr. Reid did in denouncing the war effort.

Rep. John P. Murtha, the Pennsylvania Democrat leading the anti-war push, was criticized severely last year for saying, "Now we've lost that war, and now it is time to redeploy" on ABC's "Good Morning America."