The war in Iraq: Where do the candidates stand?

The Iraq war looms as the most important foreign policy issue of the 2008 election. With thousands of U.S. troops stationed there and almost daily reports of bombings throughout the area, violence constantly threatens to engulf the country. The next president will have to grapple with the day-to-day events taking place more than 6,000 miles away. Where do the candidates stand on the war and how will this affect their policy toward the embattled Middle East?

Voting records

We’ve all seen politicians say one thing but vote another. How do the candidates add up here?

Sen. Barack Obama

• Voted against authorizing the war in 2002
• Introduced legislation to end the war in Iraq, including a plan for a phased withdrawal of combat troops

Sen. John McCain

• Voted to authorize the war in 2002

On maintaining an American presence in Iraq

So where do they stand when it concerns the future of Americans troops in Iraq?

Sen. Barack Obama

During a speech in Fayetteville, North Carolina on March 19, 2008, Obama said: “Fighting a war without end will not force the Iraqis to take responsibility for their own future…and will not make American people safer.”

• Plans to have a residual force remain in Iraq to conduct targeted counter-terrorism missions against al Qaeda in Iraq and to protect American civilians and diplomatic personnel.
• Does not advocate building permanent bases in Iraq.
• Plans to train and support Iraqi security forces as long as Iraqi leaders move towards political reconciliation.
• Obama and his military experts believe that we can safely remove 1 to 2 combat brigades from Iraq each month – which would remove them entirely by the summer of 2010.
• On July 14, 2008, Obama sounded off in an Op-Ed article in the NY Times titled “My Plan for 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.”

 Sen. John McCain

McCain addresses his strategy for Iraq on his website: “When Iraqi forces can safeguard their own country, American troops can return home.”

• Does not want to keep troops in Iraq longer than necessary, but refuses to make a concrete promise for withdrawal of forces saying that he can’t predict what the status of the war will be when he is elected. He insists that the consequences of such a promise could be disastrous to Iraq and U.S. interests in the Middle East.
• McCain wants the U.S. to work with the Iraqi government to rebuild the Iraqi economy by using its budget surplus to employ Iraqis in infrastructure projects.
• In January of 2008, McCain got into a back and forth with a local reporter. The exchange went like this
• Reporter: “President Bush has talked about our staying in Iraq for 50 years…”
• McCain responded: “Make it 100. We’ve been in South Korea, we’ve been in Japan for 60 years, we’ve been in South Korea for 50 years or so, that’d be fine with me as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or killed.”

The role of Iran (Iraq’s neighboring country)

So what's the deal with Iran? The Iranian government has defied international pressure by insisting that they will begin enriching uranium, presumably to begin making weapons.



This is especially dangerous because of Iran’s hostile view of Israel: that it should be annihilated. Unlike Iraq, Iran has real ties to terrorism, and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad seems like enough of a loose cannon that we really should be afraid that he can and will put nuclear material into the wrong hands.



Sen. Barack Obama

• Obama opposed the Kyl-Lieberman amendment, which says the U.S. should use our military presence in Iraq to counter the threat from Iran.
• Advocates using “tough direct presidential diplomacy” with Iran without preconditions. This entails offering Iran a choice: if Iran abandons its nuclear program and terrorism support, the U.S. will offer economic incentives and move toward normal diplomatic relations. If Iran does not abandon its nuclear program, Obama plans to increase economic pressure and political isolation.

Sen. John McCain

• McCain supported the Kyl-Lieberman amendment, maintaining that we should use “full force of law to prevent business dealings with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps.”
• Does not support an unconditional dialogue with neither the of the dictatorships of Syria and Iran.
• Plans to call on the international community to apply pressure on Syria and Iran to change their behavior.
• Plans on strengthening the U.S.’s regional military posture to make it clear to Iran that the US is determined to protect American forces and prevent Iranian intervention in Iraq.

Veteran Affairs:

An August 2007 study in the journal Military Medicine found that a whopping 62% of service members reported receiving some kind of mental health care since returning home from Iraq or Afghanistan. The issue demands attention now!

Sen. Barack Obama:

• Plans to combat homelessness amongst veterans by expanding programs to prevent veterans from falling into homelessness.
• Plans to improve care for poly-trauma vision impairment, prosthetics, spinal cord injury, and women’s health.
• Obama plans to improve mental health treatment by recruiting more health professions, improving screening and offering more support to families affected by PTSD. He also plans to make PTSD insurance benefits claims more fair.
• Plans to improve care for traumatic brain injury, one of the most common injuries of the Iraq war.

Sen. John McCain:

• As a former POW and victim of torture, he has personally dealt with the physical and psychological aftermath of being at war.
• Plans to enforce new standards for veterans’ access to healthcare for injuries or mental illness related to military service. The standards include:
• Healthcare no more than an hour’s drive from home
• Routine care within a week
• Urgent care within 24 hours
• Specialty care within a month
• Veterans Care Access Card: will introduce this card to supplement the ordinary VA care. The card would expand access and choice for veterans with illnesses/injuries which occurred during military service, and will permit those veterans who are not able to obtain timely VA care to get care at a private facility.
• Co-authored the Wounded Warrior Act, which addresses injuries that are specific to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The act specifically addresses screening and treatment of the unique injuries and significant rise in PTSD cases that have resulted from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
• McCain also wants to address health care for women veterans, requiring the VA to respond to the specialized needs of women, including victims of sexual assault.

Sources:

Barack Obama Website

John McCain Website

NY Times

PTSD

CNN