Obama would send at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan

Obama would send at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan
Obama's plan would be good for Canadian troops serving in Afghanistan.
-Darryl

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My Plan for Iraq

By BARACK OBAMA

Published: July 14, 2008

CHICAGO — The call by Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki for a timetable for the removal of American troops from Iraq presents an enormous opportunity. We should seize this moment to begin the phased redeployment of combat troops that I have long advocated, and that is needed for long-term success in Iraq and the security interests of the United States.

The differences on Iraq in this campaign are deep. Unlike Senator John McCain, I opposed the war in Iraq before it began, and would end it as president. I believed it was a grave mistake to allow ourselves to be distracted from the fight against Al Qaeda and the Taliban by invading a country that posed no imminent threat and had nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks. Since then, more than 4,000 Americans have died and we have spent nearly $1 trillion. Our military is overstretched. Nearly every threat we face — from Afghanistan to Al Qaeda to Iran — has grown.

In the 18 months since President Bush announced the surge, our troops have performed heroically in bringing down the level of violence. New tactics have protected the Iraqi population, and the Sunni tribes have rejected Al Qaeda — greatly weakening its effectiveness.

But the same factors that led me to oppose the surge still hold true. The strain on our military has grown, the situation in Afghanistan has deteriorated and we’ve spent nearly $200 billion more in Iraq than we had budgeted. Iraq’s leaders have failed to invest tens of billions of dollars in oil revenues in rebuilding their own country, and they have not reached the political accommodation that was the stated purpose of the surge.

The good news is that Iraq’s leaders want to take responsibility for their country by negotiating a timetable for the removal of American troops. Meanwhile, Lt. Gen. James Dubik, the American officer in charge of training Iraq’s security forces, estimates that the Iraqi Army and police will be ready to assume responsibility for security in 2009.

Only by redeploying our troops can we press the Iraqis to reach comprehensive political accommodation and achieve a successful transition to Iraqis’ taking responsibility for the security and stability of their country. Instead of seizing the moment and encouraging Iraqis to step up, the Bush administration and Senator McCain are refusing to embrace this transition — despite their previous commitments to respect the will of Iraq’s sovereign government. They call any timetable for the removal of American troops “surrender,” even though we would be turning Iraq over to a sovereign Iraqi government.

But this is not a strategy for success — it is a strategy for staying that runs contrary to the will of the Iraqi people, the American people and the security interests of the United States. That is why, on my first day in office, I would give the military a new mission: ending this war.

As I’ve said many times, we must be as careful getting out of Iraq as we were careless getting in. We can safely redeploy our combat brigades at a pace that would remove them in 16 months. That would be the summer of 2010 — two years from now, and more than seven years after the war began. After this redeployment, a residual force in Iraq would perform limited missions: going after any remnants of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, protecting American service members and, so long as the Iraqis make political progress, training Iraqi security forces. That would not be a precipitous withdrawal.

In carrying out this strategy, we would inevitably need to make tactical adjustments. As I have often said, I would consult with commanders on the ground and the Iraqi government to ensure that our troops were redeployed safely, and our interests protected. We would move them from secure areas first and volatile areas later. We would pursue a diplomatic offensive with every nation in the region on behalf of Iraq’s stability, and commit $2 billion to a new international effort to support Iraq’s refugees.

Ending the war is essential to meeting our broader strategic goals, starting in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the Taliban is resurgent and Al Qaeda has a safe haven. Iraq is not the central front in the war on terrorism, and it never has been. As Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently pointed out, we won’t have sufficient resources to finish the job in Afghanistan until we reduce our commitment to Iraq.

As president, I would pursue a new strategy, and begin by providing at least two additional combat brigades to support our effort in Afghanistan. We need more troops, more helicopters, better intelligence-gathering and more nonmilitary assistance to accomplish the mission there. I would not hold our military, our resources and our foreign policy hostage to a misguided desire to maintain permanent bases in Iraq.

In this campaign, there are honest differences over Iraq, and we should discuss them with the thoroughness they deserve. Unlike Senator McCain, I would make it absolutely clear that we seek no presence in Iraq similar to our permanent bases in South Korea, and would redeploy our troops out of Iraq and focus on the broader security challenges that we face. But for far too long, those responsible for the greatest strategic blunder in the recent history of American foreign policy have ignored useful debate in favor of making false charges about flip-flops and surrender.

It’s not going to work this time. It’s time to end this war.

Barack Obama, a United States senator from Illinois, is the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee.

Credit: New York Times

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Obama: Afghanistan, not Iraq, should be focus

Email|Link|Comments (0) Posted by Foon Rhee, deputy national political editor July 15, 2008 11:27 AM

In what is being billed as a major policy speech, Democrat Barack Obama declared this morning that "the central front in the war on terror is not Iraq, and it never was" and, if elected president, he would redirect attention and US forces to Afghanistan.

"It is unacceptable that almost seven years after nearly 3,000 Americans were killed on our soil, the terrorists who attacked us on 9/11 are still at large," he said. "Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahari are recording messages to their followers and plotting more terror. The Taliban controls parts of Afghanistan. Al Qaeda has an expanding base in Pakistan that is probably no farther from their old Afghan sanctuary than a train ride from Washington to Philadelphia. If another attack on our homeland comes, it will likely come from the same region where 9/11 was planned. And yet today, we have five times more troops in Iraq than Afghanistan."

That strategic imbalance, Obama argues, is the result of a misguided policy in Iraq that he would end by withdrawing nearly all US combat troops within 16 months of taking office -- and that would only continue under his Republican rival John McCain, a key supporter of the so-called surge of US troops that even Obama has grudgingly conceded has helped reduce violence.

"What’s missing in our debate about Iraq -- what has been missing since before the war began – is a discussion of the strategic consequences of Iraq and its dominance of our foreign policy," Obama said. "This war distracts us from every threat that we face and so many opportunities we could seize. This war diminishes our security, our standing in the world, our military, our economy, and the resources that we need to confront the challenges of the 21st century. By any measure, our single-minded and open-ended focus on Iraq is not a sound strategy for keeping America safe."

"As President, I will pursue a tough, smart and principled national security strategy -- one that recognizes that we have interests not just in Baghdad, but in Kandahar and Karachi, in Tokyo and London, in Beijing and Berlin," he continued. "I will focus this strategy on five goals essential to making America safer: ending the war in Iraq responsibly; finishing the fight against al Qaeda and the Taliban; securing all nuclear weapons and materials from terrorists and rogue states; achieving true energy security; and rebuilding our alliances to meet the challenges of the 21st century."

Asked about Obama's speech, President Bush told reporters that the war on terror is being fought in both Iraq and Afghanistan -- and that Iraq is going better now.

"Afghanistan is a tough fight," Bush said at a White House press conference.

While there has not been a terrorist attack in the US since Sept. 11, 2001, the US cannot allow safe haven for terrorists, he said. "I would hope that whoever follows me understands that we're in a war."

Obama also released a new TV ad today that highlights one facet of his speech -- his bipartisan work on stopping the smuggling of nuclear weapons.

His campaign said the ad is to air in Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Virginia.

Obama is scheduled to follow up his speech with appearances on PBS and CNN this evening. He is also scheduled to soon visit Iraq and Afghanistan for the first time since January 2006.

Later today in Albuquerque, N.M., McCain plans to answer Obama, including criticism of Obama for outlining his plans for Iraq and Afghanistan before actually visiting the war-torn countries.

"Senator Obama is departing soon on a trip abroad that will include a fact-finding mission to Iraq and Afghanistan," McCain plans to say, according to excerpts released by his campaign. "And I note that he is speaking today about his plans for Iraq and Afghanistan before he has even left, before he has talked to General Petraeus, before he has seen the progress in Iraq, and before he has set foot in Afghanistan for the first time. In my experience, fact-finding missions usually work best the other way around: first you assess the facts on the ground, then you present a new strategy."

McCain is trying to press his advantage among voters on terror and national security -- the only issues, in fact, that polls show Americans have more confidence in McCain. A Washington Post-ABC News poll published today shows that 72 percent of Americans say McCain would make a good commander-in-chief, while only 48 percent said Obama would and 48 percent said he would not.

On the specific question of Iraq, however, the survey found that Americans are evenly divided on Obama's timetable for withdrawal and McCain's position that events on the ground should decide the next moves. And Americans are also split on which candidate they trust more to handle Iraq.

While McCain pushed for the surge and a different strategy against the insurgency later in the war, Democrats are trying to tie McCain to his support of President Bush earlier in the conflict, hoping to dent his advantage on nationa security.

In a new web video released today, the Democratic National Committee accuses McCain of trying to rewrite history. The video juxtaposes a top McCain adviser saying on a weekend political talk show that it would be wrong to say that McCain was aligned with the president on Iraq with clips of McCain on several TV shows enthusiastically backing the Bush administration.

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Obama calls Afghanistan a top priority By Glen Johnson, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON - U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said Tuesday that overall U.S. interests have been hurt rather than helped by the current government's decision to increase troop strength in Iraq 18 months ago as he vowed to withdraw combat troops within 16 months of becoming president.

Obama said his White House rival, Sen. John McCain, "has argued that the gains of the surge mean that I should change my commitment to end the war. But this argument misconstrues what is necessary to succeed in Iraq, and stubbornly ignores the facts of the broader strategic picture that we face."

In a speech delivered in advance of an overseas trip to the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan, Obama said fighting al-Qaida and the Taliban in Afghanistan would be his top priority.

The speech billed as a major address by the campaign offered no new policy, but a high-profile explanation of his opposition to the war and his pledge to complete a U.S. troop pullout within 16 months of becoming president. It also gave him a forum for criticizing President George W. Bush and McCain.

"By any measure, our single-minded and opened-ended focus on Iraq is not a sound strategy for keeping America safe," Obama said at the Ronald Reagan International Trade Center. "I am running for president of the United States to lead this country in a new direction."

"I will end this war as president," he said, speaking from a podium that said "Judgment to Lead." Obama addressed the crowd with a line of American flags behind him.

Obama's last trip to Iraq was in 2006. He has never been to Afghanistan. The campaign was keeping the exact dates of the trip secret for security reasons.

"This war distracts us from every threat that we face and so many opportunities that we could seize," Obama said. "This war diminishes our security, our standing in the world, our military, our economy and the resources that we need to confront the challenges of the 21st century."

Meanwhile, Bush was asked at a news conference he held at the White House what advice he might give Obama as he prepared to visit Iraq. The president said he would ask Obama to listen carefully to Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander, and U.S. Ambassador Ryan Crocker.

"It's a temptation to let the politics at home get in the way, you know, with the considered judgment of the commanders," Bush said. He defended his policy and maintained that the effort in Iraq was succeeding and acknowledged that the war in Afghanistan remained "a tough fight."