The two major US presidential rivals on Tuesday sharpened their long-standing dispute over the Iraq War. Democratic Senator Barack Obama called it a costly distraction that must end, while Republican Senator John McCain insisted it is a conflict the US has to win.
“I will end this war as president,” Obama said of Iraq.
The likely Democratic nominee struck a stately pose as he delivered a lengthy foreign policy address ahead of an upcoming overseas trip.
He spoke from a podium that said “Judgment to Lead” set up before an array of US flags.
“Iraq is not going to be a perfect place, and we don’t have unlimited resources to try and make it one,” Obama said in a speech on Tuesday in which he also said the US must shift its focus to defeating the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.
Answering Obama, McCain gave his own speech in which the ex-Navy pilot, Vietnam prisoner of war and four-term Arizona senator cited his decades of military experience to paint his rival as unprepared.
“I know how to win wars,” the Republican nominee-in-waiting asserted, leaving unspoken the suggestion that Obama does not. “In wartime, judgment and experience matter ... The commander in chief doesn’t get a learning curve.”
McCain said Obama “will tell you we can’t win in Afghanistan without losing in Iraq. In fact, he has it exactly backwards.”
Foreign policy issues — the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in particular — returned to the forefront for both campaigns even as news about the US economy, the top issue for voters this year, grew gloomier. US government officials were struggling to find a mechanism to rebalance the US’ finances that have been knocked severely out of whack by soaring energy costs, liquidity shortages among investment firms and banks, climbing food costs and increased unemployment.
Obama said he would send about 7,000 more troops to Afghanistan, the landlocked country that was an al-Qaeda haven at the time of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. McCain said as many as 10,500 additional troops were needed, but chided Obama for discounting recent US successes in Iraq.
After his swift response, McCain sought to clarify that he was not necessarily talking about sending that many US troops, saying NATO countries that are contributing forces could be called upon to increase their presence.
He further said he would employ tactics in Afghanistan akin to those used by US forces during the so-called troop surge in Iraq. Most of the additional 30,000 US troops sent for the buildup last year have now been withdrawn and violence in Iraq is at a four-year low, according to the US military.
While the two men agreed on the importance of prevailing in Afghanistan, the dispute veered in a new direction when it came to the tribal areas of next-door Pakistan, where al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and his supporters are thought to be hiding.
McCain accused Obama of “trying to sound tough” by speaking publicly of taking unilateral action against those blamed for the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Undeterred, Obama said, “If Pakistan cannot or will not act, we will take out high-level terrorist targets like bin Laden if we have them in our sights.”
Despite his rhetoric, Obama refrained from saying the Bush administration’s so-called surge in troop strength in Iraq had failed. Aides said his campaign Web site had been altered in recent days to remove references to that effect.
The two men sparred as Obama looked ahead to an overseas trip that will include stops in Iraq and Afghanistan, two countries where thousands of US combat forces are engaged in combat.
Given differences in age and experience between the two rivals, Obama’s trip has taken on elements of an audition for a man seeking overall charge of US war policy as well as foreign policy in general.
Eleven people, including a former minister, were arrested in Serbia on Friday over a train station disaster in which 16 people died. The concrete canopy of the newly renovated station in the northern city of Novi Sad collapsed on Nov. 1, 2024 in a disaster widely blamed on corruption and poor oversight. It sparked a wave of student-led protests and led to the resignation of then-Serbian prime minister Milos Vucevic and the fall of his government. The public prosecutor’s office in Novi Sad opened an investigation into the accident and deaths. In February, the public prosecutor’s office for organized crime opened another probe into
RISING RACISM: A Japanese group called on China to assure safety in the country, while the Chinese embassy in Tokyo urged action against a ‘surge in xenophobia’ A Japanese woman living in China was attacked and injured by a man in a subway station in Suzhou, China, Japanese media said, hours after two Chinese men were seriously injured in violence in Tokyo. The attacks on Thursday raised concern about xenophobic sentiment in China and Japan that have been blamed for assaults in both countries. It was the third attack involving Japanese living in China since last year. In the two previous cases in China, Chinese authorities have insisted they were isolated incidents. Japanese broadcaster NHK did not identify the woman injured in Suzhou by name, but, citing the Japanese
Nauru has started selling passports to fund climate action, but is so far struggling to attract new citizens to the low-lying, largely barren island in the Pacific Ocean. Nauru, one of the world’s smallest nations, has a novel plan to fund its fight against climate change by selling so-called “Golden Passports.” Selling for US$105,000 each, Nauru plans to drum up more than US$5 million in the first year of the “climate resilience citizenship” program. Almost six months after the scheme opened in February, Nauru has so far approved just six applications — covering two families and four individuals. Despite the slow start —
YELLOW SHIRTS: Many protesters were associated with pro-royalist groups that had previously supported the ouster of Paetongtarn’s father, Thaksin, in 2006 Protesters rallied on Saturday in the Thai capital to demand the resignation of court-suspended Thai Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra and in support of the armed forces following a violent border dispute with Cambodia that killed more than three dozen people and displaced more than 260,000. Gathered at Bangkok’s Victory Monument despite soaring temperatures, many sang patriotic songs and listened to speeches denouncing Paetongtarn and her father, former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and voiced their backing of the country’s army, which has always retained substantial power in the Southeast Asian country. Police said there were about 2,000 protesters by mid-afternoon, although
RSS