McCain Stumbles Will Be a Boost to Obama on Foreign Policy
- ...a series of self-inflicted wounds on what before this week was indisputably John McCain’s strongest suit - his ability to talk persuasively about the way to win the war on terror in the twin battles of Iraq and Afghanistan.
McCain made several errors this week in matters fundamental to understanding how and when both wars began and finished the week coming within a hair of embracing Obama’s 16-month timetable for US troop withdrawals.
In the kinetic world of instant blog posts and furious back-and-forth between campaigns fighting like terriers on steroids over every miscue - real or imagined - it is sometimes hard to measure the damage done over the course of a week.
The Obama’s inner circle, they believe McCain set himself back not only with the general public but also with top-flight Republicans who will have to try to clean up McCain’s national security debris.
* On July 21st, McCain said on Good Morning America that the situation was tough in Afghanistan, particularly, he said, “given the struggle on the Iraq-Pakistan border.”
* On July 22 in an interview Katie Couric of CBS, McCain said the troop surge President Bush ordered in January 2007 and which didn’t reach maximum tactical deployment for months after led to the so-called Sunni awakening or uprising against Al Qaeda in Iraq terrorists. While the surge no doubt gave greater confidence to Sunnis over time, the awakening began in the fall of 2006 with the moves against AI Qaeda by a collection of high-profile tribal sheiks.
* On July 23, McCain said the surge wasn’t really about more troops, but counter-insurgency tactics. And yet the political credit McCain seeks for the turn-around in Iraq is based principally on his advocacy if the surge - meaning more troops to carry out counter-insurgency missions. To say the surge wasn’t really about more troops undercuts much of McCain has tried to tell the public about what has changed in Iraq and why.
* And Friday on CNN, McCain said 16 months for a troop withdrawal from Iraq is “a pretty good timetable.” His campaign said McCain meant it was good so long as conditions on the ground warranted troop withdrawals. But the damage was done. Just check the profusion of blog posts in the hours immediately after the CNN interview with McCain.
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