WASHINGTON — Two of the Senate's most respected Republicans cast aside President Bush's pleas for patience on Iraq Friday and proposed legislation demanding a new strategy by mid-October to restrict the mission of U.S. troops.

The proposal, by GOP veterans John Warner of Virginia and Richard Lugar of Indiana, came as the Pentagon conceded a decreasing number of Iraqi battalions are able to operate on their own.

"American military and diplomatic strategy in Iraq must adjust to the reality that sectarian factionalism is not likely to abate anytime soon and probably cannot be controlled from the top," the Warner-Lugar proposal states.

Democrats and the White House were dismissive of the proposal. However, it could attract significant support from GOP colleagues who are frustrated by Iraq but reluctant to break ranks with their party or force the hand of a wartime president.

The two senators are considered the GOP's foremost national security experts. Warner was the longtime chairman of the Armed Services Committee until stepping down last year, while Lugar is the top Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee.

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TEENS ARRESTED FOR ALLEGED PLOT AGAINST SCHOOL

NEW YORK — Two teenagers were charged with conspiring to attack a Long Island high school on the anniversary of the Columbine attacks after a chilling journal and videotape surfaced in which one teen identifies several potential victims by name, authorities said Friday.

"I will start a chain of terrorism in the world," a 15-year-old suspected of planning the assault allegedly wrote in the journal, which led to his arrest. "This will go down in history. Take out everyone there. Perfecto."

Both teens were charged with misdemeanor conspiracy, punishable by up to a year in jail. The 15-year-old was scheduled to appear in juvenile court Friday; the second suspect, 17-year-old Michael McDonough, pleaded not guilty.

Authorities said the two suspects, co-workers at a suburban McDonald's, targeted scores of students in an attack they planned for April 20, 2008 — the ninth anniversary of the Columbine High School rampage, where 12 students and a teacher were killed in Littleton, Colo.

The two teens planned to attack Connetquot High School in Bohemia, about 50 miles east of New York City, Dormer said. The 15-year-old was the driving force behind the plan, authorities said, and was recently suspended for making threats of violence.

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N. KOREA POISED TO SCALE BACK NUCLEAR PROGRAM

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea seemed ready Friday to take a first step toward scaling back its nuclear weapons program, perhaps this weekend, as U.N. inspectors prepared to monitor the shutdown of its sole operating atomic reactor.

The team from the International Atomic Energy Agency stopped in Beijing en route to the North, with its Saturday arrival in Pyongyang scheduled just hours after a South Korean oil shipment was to enter a North Korean port — a promised reward for the reactor shutdown pledge.

After years of tortuous negotiations and delays during which the North argued its nuclear program was needed for self-defense, the reclusive communist regime said last week that once it got the oil shipment, it would consider halting its reactor for the first time in five years.

North Korea did not, however, give any timetable for starting the shutdown. The tanker was due to arrive Saturday morning, and officials said it would take 48 hours to pump out its load of 6,200 tons of heavy fuel oil.

But U.N. officials expressed optimism that North Korean officials were ready to go forward with the shutdown of the plutonium-producing reactor at Yongbyon, about 60 miles northeast of the capital.

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U.S. TROOPS KILL 6 IRAQI POLICE IN RARE BATTLE

BAGHDAD — U.S. troops battled Iraqi police suspected of links to Iranian-backed Shiite militiamen, killing six in a rare firefight between American soldiers and their Iraqi partners. Friday's clash underscored the deep infiltration of militants in the country's security forces.

The battle came a day after the Bush administration acknowledged that the Iraqi government was making "unsatisfactory" progress in its efforts to purge the police force of Shiite militia — among the elusive benchmarks Washington believes are needed to stabilize the country.

Shiite militias have considerable power within police ranks, prompting many Sunni Arabs to shun the force. Sunnis accuse the police of helping — or participating in — death squads that have slain thousands of members of their sect.

In addition to the six police officers, seven gunmen were also killed in Friday's clash in eastern Baghdad, sparked when U.S. troops arrested a police lieutenant, the American military said in a statement. It said the lieutenant was believed to be helping Iran organize Shiite militants and leading a cell involved in bomb and mortar attacks on U.S. and Iraqi troops.

The U.S. military has accused Iran of arming Shiite extremists drawn from the ranks of militias and organizing them into a network to carry out attacks on the troops. Friday's statement, however, was the first time the military has spoken of the Iranian efforts extending into the Iraqi police. It was unclear whether the lieutenant was a militiaman who joined the police or a policeman who later joined the militia.

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ARMY RESERVIST ASKS COURT TO STOP 5TH DEPLOYMENT

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Army Reserve Sgt. Erik Botta has been sent to Iraq three times and to Afghanistan once. He thinks that's enough.

Botta wants a court to block the military's plan to deploy him for a fifth time Sunday, most likely to Iraq. He isn't against the war — but he thinks he can serve his country better now by working for a defense contractor and pursuing his education.

"This has nothing to do with protest of the war ... I have nothing but respect for the people on the ground," Botta said Friday, one day after he filed his petition in U.S. District Court in West Palm Beach. "But I feel I do need a fair decision and a fair review."

Botta, 26, of Port St. Lucie, contends in his petition that the Army's refusal to exempt him from deployment "constitutes unlawful custody." Botta argues the Army did not consider the length and nature of his previous tours "to assure a sharing of exposure to the hazards of combat."

He was granted an initial exemption last year, allowing him to pursue an electrical engineering degree at Palm Beach Community College and work as a senior technician on Blackhawk and Seahawk helicopters at Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. But now his exemption has been denied.

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NINTENDO CONTINUES TO SCORE WITH WII

SANTA MONICA, Calif. — Legendary Nintendo designer Shigeru Miyamoto knows when his grand vision of video games for the masses has arrived.

"When my relatives start talking to me about video games, then I'll know that I have succeeded," the brainchild behind "Donkey Kong" and other hits said at this week's E3 Media and Business Summit.

For Miyamoto and Nintendo Co., making games more appealing to a broader audience has been a core strategy in recent years. And it appears to be working.

Eight months since the Japanese company launched the Wii, the $250 console has been the top-selling system over far more expensive and technologically sophisticated machines from Microsoft Corp. and Sony Corp.