That's an understatement. Have you heard him lately on this issue? Gads, Iraq couldn't be improving at the worst possible time, for Obama
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By Michael Cooper and Jeff Zeleny Published: July 4, 2008Senator Barack Obama said he might "refine" his Iraq policies after meeting with military commanders there later this summer. But hours later he held a second news conference to emphasize his commitment to the withdrawing of all combat troops from Iraq within 16 months of taking office.
His two statements, made Thursday in Fargo, North Dakota, reflected how the changing dynamics in Iraq have posed a challenge for Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. He has been trying to retain flexibility as violence declines there without abandoning one of the central promises of his campaign: that if elected he would end the war.
His remarks came as Republicans - including his all-but-certain Republican rival, Senator John McCain - have been arguing that Obama would most likely change his position on the phased withdrawal. They argue that with violence dropping there, bringing the troops home would risk erasing the fragile gains that have been made.
Obama said at his first news conference that he planned a "thorough assessment" of his Iraq policy when he visits the country later this summer. "I've always said that the pace of withdrawal would be dictated by the safety and security of our troops and the need to maintain stability," he said. "That assessment has not changed. And when I go to Iraq and have a chance to talk to some of the commanders on the ground, I'm sure I'll have more information and will continue to refine my policies."
Obama has long spoken of consulting with commanders in the field as part of his plan for a phased withdrawal from Iraq, but his shift in emphasis in the way he spoke about the situation on Thursday - after weeks in which Republicans and even an outside Iraq-policy adviser to the Obama campaign argued against a withdrawal along the lines he had proposed - fueled speculation that he might not be wedded to his timetable.
"We're going to try this again," Obama said. "Apparently, I wasn't clear enough this morning on my position with respect to the war in Iraq."
The evolving situation in Iraq has, in fact, tested both candidates. McCain, whose support for the unpopular war helped him win the Republican primary, now finds that he must explain his position to a general electorate largely weary of the war. And for Obama, who has been accused recently of changing his positions on campaign finance and a wiretapping law, the suggestion that he was having second thoughts about a central premise of his candidacy holds particular perils.
In his second news conference Thursday, Obama laid out his proposal in less ambiguous terms.
"Let me be as clear as I can be," he said. "I intend to end this war. My first day in office, I will bring the Joint Chiefs of Staff in, and I will give them a new mission, and that is to end this war - responsibly, deliberately, but decisively. And I have seen no information that contradicts the notion that we can bring our troops out safely at a pace of one to two brigades a month, and again, that pace translates into having our combat troops out in 16 months' time."
Obama added that when he had spoken about possibly refining his policies, he was referring to questions about how big a residual force should be left behind to train Iraqi forces and conduct counterterrorism operations - not the overall timeline for withdrawal.
Obama's positioning on this issue has been a critical component of his candidacy from the beginning. He, almost alone among the major candidates, opposed the Iraq war from the start, and that helped him beat a crowded Democratic field. And while he has long said that he would consult the commanders in the field when withdrawing troops, the caveat might have been lost on many Democratic primary voters who supported his call to end the war.
With violence ebbing there, though, he has recently spoken less about withdrawal and increasingly emphasized the failure to achieve political reconciliation in Iraq. And in recent weeks he has spoken more of the economic costs of the Iraq war - and the fact that it limits the ability of the United States to send troops to fight what he considers the nation's primary security threat: Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan.
McCain's support for the unpopular Iraq war, meanwhile, could pose problems heading into the general election. To that end, he, too, has shifted his emphasis. After taking heat for saying that he would keep troops in Iraq for up to a hundred years if necessary, he gave a speech this spring suggesting that he would remove most troops by 2013, without offering specifics. He now talks more about withdrawing, as he did over a week ago when he said "we will withdraw, but we will withdraw with victory and honor."
Iraq, of course, remains very dangerous, as a series of lethal attacks in June showed. But fewer Americans were killed there in May than in any month since the conflict began, and violence across the nation has dropped significantly.
Foreign policy experts attribute the reduction to a number of factors, including the defection of Sunni insurgents who are now paid to keep the peace and the cease-fires brokered with various Shiite militias as well as the addition of more troops - the last of whom are leaving the country this month - and adoption of a counter-insurgency strategy.
Some foreign policy experts say that both candidates may have to adjust their stances once in office - McCain, because strains on the military may make it impossible to station as many troops there for as long as he likes, and Obama, because the threat of backsliding may force him to slow the pace of withdrawal.
Obama said that under his plan, there would still be combat troops in Iraq in 2010, seven years after the war began. And he questioned the premise that the recent gains could complicate the withdrawal.
"Those are the same folks who said that we can't pull troops out because things are too violent," he said. "Now that the violence has subsided, you can't pull troops out because things have improved. It's a Catch-22."
Can we say "flip Flop"? I knew you could
