http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Front_Page/FE08Aa01.htmlBy Jim Lobe
WASHINGTON - With the scandal over the abuse of prisoners in US military custody in Iraq still growing, the administration of President George W Bush appears to be shaken to its very core.
While the immediate question is whether Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld could be sufficiently persuasive in congressional testimony scheduled for Friday to survive the fast-spreading calls for his resignation, the larger issue has abruptly become whether the US occupation of Iraq, for which the administration has just asked an additional US$25 billion (also covering operations in Afghanistan) this year, is sustainable.
That question was put front and center on Thursday by Representative John Murtha, a conservative and highly influential Democrat close to the Pentagon. In private meetings this week, he reportedly told fellow Democrats that the war was "unwinnable" and on Thursday issued a blistering attack on the Bush administration's strategy and "miscalculations" on Iraq.
"We either have to mobilize or we have to get out," Murtha declared in an emotional press conference in which he disclosed the content of a series of written warnings he had sent to Bush and other top officials since his first of many visits to Iraq since last September.
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