Bush limits Iraq troop withdrawal to 8,000 and orders 'quiet surge' in Afghanistan

President George Bush punctured hopes of a big reduction in US troops in Iraq yesterday when he announced the withdrawal of 8,000 troops by February, and only a small troop increase for Afghanistan.

Although he acknowledged that the Taliban and al-Qaida are posing more of a threat in Afghanistan, Bush ordered only an extra marine battalion and army combat brigade, amounting to just a few thousand troops, into the country. He described the reinforcements as "a quiet surge".

In what will probably be his last big decision about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars that have defined his presidency, Bush basically left a decision about deployments to the next president, who takes office on January 20.

Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential candidate, described Bush's moves as "modest" and "coming up short". He said that Bush had failed to recognise the urgency of the situation in Afghanistan because the new brigade was not due to arrive until February.

Bush's speech to the National Defence University, in Washington, dashed speculation over the last few months that he planned a huge reduction of US forces in Iraq before he left office so he could go out on a high note.

Bush said there had been improvements in security in Iraq over the last year. "Here is the bottom line: while the enemy in Iraq is still dangerous, we have seized the offensive, and Iraqi forces are becomingly increasingly capable of leading and winning the fight." He cited Anbar province, once one of the centres of unrest, as a success, with violence down 90%, and said that violence in the country as a whole was at its lowest since spring 2004.

Bush and the Republican presidential candidate, John McCain, would have liked to have seen tens of thousands of troops brought home. But Bush was forced to rethink his plans after a briefing from the US commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, that such a huge reduction would be premature and would endanger the improved security. Petraeus advocated keeping troops at the same level until June. But Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said the risk posed by withdrawing some troops earlier than that was minimal.

McCain had wanted significant reductions in order to blunt Obama's pledge to pull all US combat troops out of Iraq within 16 months of becoming president. Obama has also said that Bush and McCain underestimate the threat posed by the Taliban and al-Qaida in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and has promised a significant reinforcement of US troops in Afghanistan.

There are 157,000 US troops in Iraq and Kuwait, of whom 146,000 are in Iraq. The withdrawal announced yesterday will reduce the total in Iraq to 138,000, more than when Bush ordered an extra 31,000 troops to Iraq in January last year, which he said would be a year-long deployment.

A marine battalion, numbering about 1,000 troops, is to go home from Iraq in November and not be replaced. An army brigade of between 3,500 and 4,000 troops will leave in February. About 3,400 support troops are also to be withdrawn before February.

A marine battalion, numbering about 1,000, is to go to Afghanistan to join the 34,000 US troops there. Although Bush did not specify numbers, the army brigade that will arrive in February could amount to about 3,000-4,000.

The Democratic chairman of the House of Representatives armed services committee, Ike Skelton, welcomed the reduction but said Bush was deferring the strategic decision until the next presidency.

"More significant troop reductions in Iraq are needed so that we can start to rebuild US military readiness and provide the additional forces needed to finish the fight in Afghanistan," he said.

The Democratic senate leader, Harry Reid, who has been pressing for an early withdrawal of all US combat troops from Iraq, said he was "stunned" so few troops were being brought home and over the failure to address the danger posed in Afghanistan. "As Democrats have been saying for years and as I saw with my own eyes last month, violence in Afghanistan has surged because Bush-McCain Republicans have all but ignored the true central front of the war on terror while keeping the bulk of our troops tied down in Iraq."

Petraeus may have planned, as the US media has reported, to recommend a bigger cutback in US forces in Iraq. But events may have forced him to alter this, such as Georgia pulling its 2,000 troops out of Iraq to confront the threat posed by Russia.