The general in charge of the “surge” plan in Iraq will meet Democrat leaders on Capitol Hill today as they prepare to send President Bush legislation demanding a withdrawal of US troops from October 1.

General David Petraeus will give senators a closed-door briefing on the White House strategy, after Congress defied the President’s threatened veto yesterday on funding the war.

After negotiations between the House and the Senate, Congress will send Mr Bush a war spending Bill of $124 billion (£62 billion), possibly as early as Friday, accompanied by a demand that all combat troops be withdrawn from Iraq by April 1 next year, with the pullout beginning in less than six months.

Reacting to the Bill, and comments by the Democrats’ Senate Leader, Harry Reid, that Mr Bush was “in denial” about Iraq, the President stood on the White House South Lawn yesterday and repeated his vow to veto the legislation.

“I’m disappointed that the Democratic leadership has chosen this course,” he said. Mr Bush accused Democrats of “handcuffing” his generals on the ground and of giving succour to the enemy.

Democrats lack the two-thirds majority to override Mr Bush’s veto, and are undecided on how to proceed. Most realise that to cut off funding would be politically untenable. Some want a short-term funding Bill that would force Congress, and Mr Bush, to revisit the issue this summer. Others back giving the President what he wants while setting their sights on next year’s spending legislation.

General Petraeus is expected to tell senators that modest progress has been made in Baghdad, with a decrease in sectarian violence. But he arrives on Capitol Hill after the deaths of ten US soldiers on Monday and a sharp increase in deadly suicide attacks outside Baghdad by Sunni and al-Qaeda insurgents.

Mr Reid — who said on Friday that the Iraq war was “lost” — likened Mr Bush to Lyndon Johnson, saying that the former president ordered troop escalations in Vietnam in an attempt “to save his political legacy”, only to watch US casualties climb steadily.

Mr Bush countered: “The American people did not vote for failure. That is precisely what the Democratic leadership’s Bill would guarantee. It’s not too late for Congress to do the right thing.”

Times Recommends

• Henning Mankell: ‘If Wallander was alive, I wouldn’t be a friend of his’
• Secret society's skull and crossbones for sale
• Nigerian leader vanishes after medical treatment