By Christopher Williams,Staff Writer

Members of Maine’s congressional delegation say President Bush needs to plot a clear strategy for bringing U.S. troops home from Iraq.

They stop short of calling for an immediate withdrawal or timed pullout.

Congressman Tom Allen, a Democrat, was most specific, saying at a meeting with the Sun Journal editorial board Thursday that Bush should set the goal of having most troops out of Iraq in two years.

In the meantime, the United States should assist in building Iraqi police and military forces, rebuilding their infrastructure and creating a new government, he said.

Allen, who voted in 2002 against the resolution giving Bush the authority to invade Iraq, said he expects Bush to announce the withdrawal of U.S. troops next year in response to increasingly poor polling numbers.

In a November poll, 67 percent of Mainers said they disapproved of Bush’s handling of the war in Iraq, according to Strategic Marketing Services in Portland. National polls show similar ratings.

Allen said both Bush and Congress need to be clear that the United States has no long-term interest in occupying Iraq, language he drafted into proposed legislation that is stuck in committee. Otherwise, it would give the impression that the United States was interested only in Iraq’s oil production, he said.

Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, both Republicans, said Bush needs to update Congress and the rest of the country regularly about progress made in Iraq. They supported a bipartisan Senate resolution passed last month seeking “a significant transition to full Iraqi sovereignty” in 2006.

Bush’s exit strategy should include specific accomplishments that would lead to an incremental withdrawal, Snowe said in a prepared statement.

But Snowe doesn’t believe Bush should set any dates, said spokesman Preston Hartman.

Collins echoed that sentiment.

“It would be counterproductive for the United States to announce a timetable for the withdrawal,” she said in written remarks. “Such a deadline would only give insurgents and jihadists an incentive to simply outlast us.”

Congressman Mike Michaud, a Democrat who represents the 2nd District, said the Bush administration must “supply a real plan for the future” of the United States’ role in Iraq.