Obey called the report a “fish or cut bait” assessment. “It gives the president one year to demonstrate what he can do,” he said.

In unveiling the House bill, Obey told reporters that — as he did for the Vietnam War in 1969 — he would give the administration one year to evaluate progress in Afghanistan and Pakistan before deciding whether to formally oppose the war.

Kerry and other leading Democratic senators said they were deferring to the White House to set metrics for measuring progress.

The subjects of Obey’s required report “are the kinds of things that the benchmarks would consist of,” said Sen. Ben Nelson , D-Neb., a longtime proponent of benchmarks, “but the State and Defense Departments are trying to put together benchmarks that are far more expansive than that.”

Senate Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin , D-Mich., said he expected the administration to create the benchmarks so there is no need to add them to the supplemental bill.

Debate Over Prison Continues

Meanwhile, Senate Republicans took to the microphones Tuesday to decry any potential efforts to include money or language in the supplemental bill that might pave the way for detainees to be moved to U.S. soil if and when the prison at Guantánamo Bay is closed.

Obey tried to head off that debate by not including in the House bill $80 million requested for the effort by the administration.

“The administration still has not come up with a plan that it is willing to announce about what it will do with the prisoners come January of 2010,” said Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell , R-Ky., echoing Obey’s concerns.

Sen. Saxby Chambliss , R-Ga., said he would soon introduce a bill restricting funds “so that Americans can take some security in the fact of knowing that if these individuals are transferred to U.S. soil that they are not going to be released into their neighborhoods.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid , D-Nev., said that while he would like more specifics as well, the GOP outcry was premature and misplaced.

“We don’t want these detainees walking the streets of America, nor does anyone else,” Reid said, “Let President Obama execute his plan.”

Some senators, including appropriator Tom Harkin , D-Iowa, support inclusion of the $80 million in their chamber’s version of the supplemental.

House appropriator James P. Moran , D-Va., who has been a strong proponent of closing the Guantánamo facility, said the debate over the funding in the supplemental bill was largely irrelevant.

“The reality is there is more than sufficient money available” in other accounts that the Pentagon can use anyway, said Moran, adding that Obey’s move to exclude the funds was meant to speed passage of the bill and avoid holding up the legislation.

Counterinsurgency Funding

On Pakistan, the House bill would switch $400 million of counterinsurgency funding from the Defense Department to the State Department, even though both Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton testified last week that the Defense Department was the only department capable of distributing the funds this year.

“It’s almost moot right now because there’s agreement in policy, so it doesn’t make much difference if it’s given to the State Department or the Defense Department at this point,” said Moran.

Some Republicans also continue to push the idea of a separate appropriations bill for Pakistan that would speed an additional $400 million or so to that government.

Richard C. Holbrooke, the administration’s special envoy to the region, did not raise the idea of a separate, faster spending bill in his appearance before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday. The previous day, Obey had rejected the idea of a “quickie bill” to speed aid to Pakistan.

Bart Jansen, Edward Epstein, Kathleen Hunter and Adam Graham-Silverman contributed to this story.