Your campaign manager, David Plouffe, you will get us out of Iraq in 16 months at the most. So you'd give the same rock-hard pledge, that no matter what the military commanders said, you would give the order: Bring them home.
MR. GIBSON: And Senator Obama, your campaign manager, David Plouffe, said, when he is -- this is talking about you -- when he is elected president, we will be out of Iraq in 16 months at the most; there should be no confusion about that.
So you'd give the same rock-hard pledge, that no matter what the military commanders said, you would give the order: Bring them home.
SENATOR OBAMA: Because the commander in chief sets the mission, Charlie. That's not the role of the generals. And one of the things that's been interesting about the president's approach lately has been to say, well, I'm just taking cues from General Petraeus.
Well, the president sets the mission. The general and our troops carry out that mission. And unfortunately we have had a bad mission, set by our civilian leadership, which our military has performed brilliantly. But it is time for us to set a strategy that is going to make the American people safer.
Now, I will always listen to our commanders on the ground with respect to tactics. Once I've given them a new mission, that we are going to proceed deliberately in an orderly fashion out of Iraq and we are going to have our combat troops out, we will not have permanent bases there, once I've provided that mission, if they come to me and want to adjust tactics, then I will certainly take their recommendations into consideration; but ultimately the buck stops with me as the commander in chief.
And what I have to look at is not just the situation in Iraq, but the fact that we continue to see al Qaeda getting stronger in Afghanistan and in Pakistan, we continue to see anti-American sentiment fanned all cross the Middle East, we are overstretched in a way -- we do not have a strategic reserve at this point. If there was another crisis that was taking place, we would not have a brigade that we could send to deal with that crisis that isn't already scheduled to be deployed in Iraq. That is not sustainable. That's not smart national security policy, and it's going to change when I'm president.
3 comments
#1 Matthew Burton May 18, 2008
This is really important if Iraq matters to you. In reality, withdrawing from Iraq will not be as quick or as simple as Obama makes it sound. Even his top adviser on Iraq recommends keeping over 60,000 troops in Iraq through 2010. In 2006, Obama said, "I am not suggesting that this timetable be overly rigid. ... The redeployment could be temporarily suspended if the parties in Iraq reach an effective political arrangement that stabilizes the situation...it is conceivable that a significantly reduced U.S. force might remain in Iraq for a more extended period of time."
This New Republic article is critical for understanding the finer points of what Obama is proposing. Points off for not telling the whole story.
#2 Dan Phiffer May 27, 2008
I'm not sure he makes it out to be simple or quick in this video, although he may be doing that elsewhere in his campaign. The question was about whether he would resist pushback from military commanders and I think he gave a straightforward answer.
#3 Matthew Burton May 27, 2008
Dan,
the simplification lies in Obama's pledge to withdraw within 16 months. This comes at the very beginning of the video, which tails off into a related matter: the president's working relationship with military commanders. I forgive Obama for interpreting Gibson's question so technically; he is a lawyer, afterall. But the heart of this question is about how soon Obama would withdraw from Iraq. On that note, he reaffirmed his pledge, so that's why I said he was oversimplifying the problem.
Voters who want us out of Iraq soon will point to this video as evidence of Obama's stance on this issue, and if they do so on this Web site, I want them to know it's more than just a matter of telling military commanders, "Come home." It's a matter of possibility as well.