WASHINGTON, Jan 8 (Reuters) - President George W. Bush has decided to send about 20,000 more U.S. troops to Iraq, a Republican senator who met the president on Monday said.

"It was clear to me that a decision has been made for a surge of, I suppose, 20,000 additional troops," Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon told reporters in a telephone conference call after a White House meeting.

Smith said the president had told him and several other senators that the plan for the additional troops had originated with Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. Maliki had made commitments that the Iraqi government and military would take steps to strengthen security in exchange for more U.S. troops, Smith said.

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