This article is from the source 'nytimes' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/14/world/middleeast/obama-finds-he-cant-put-iraq-behind-him.html
The article has changed 4 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
| Version 0 | Version 1 |
|---|---|
| Obama Finds He Can’t Put Iraq Behind Him | Obama Finds He Can’t Put Iraq Behind Him |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| WASHINGTON — In a high-profile speech to Army cadets last month, President Obama tried to move beyond America’s tumultuous adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan with a new doctrine all but forswearing the use of military power except in the most dire of circumstances. | WASHINGTON — In a high-profile speech to Army cadets last month, President Obama tried to move beyond America’s tumultuous adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan with a new doctrine all but forswearing the use of military power except in the most dire of circumstances. |
| Barely two weeks later, Mr. Obama has already found himself in those circumstances and seems on the verge of ordering the American military to intervene once more in Iraq. While ruling out ground troops to save the beleaguered Baghdad government from insurgents, Mr. Obama is considering a range of options, including airstrikes by drones and piloted aircraft. | Barely two weeks later, Mr. Obama has already found himself in those circumstances and seems on the verge of ordering the American military to intervene once more in Iraq. While ruling out ground troops to save the beleaguered Baghdad government from insurgents, Mr. Obama is considering a range of options, including airstrikes by drones and piloted aircraft. |
| The possible return to Iraq, even in limited form, underscores just how much that forlorn land has shaped Mr. Obama’s presidency. It defined his first campaign for the White House, when his opposition to the war powered his candidacy. It defined his foreign policy as he resolved to pull out of Iraq and keep out of places like Syria. And it defined the legacy he hoped to leave as he imagined history books remembering him for ending America’s overseas wars. | The possible return to Iraq, even in limited form, underscores just how much that forlorn land has shaped Mr. Obama’s presidency. It defined his first campaign for the White House, when his opposition to the war powered his candidacy. It defined his foreign policy as he resolved to pull out of Iraq and keep out of places like Syria. And it defined the legacy he hoped to leave as he imagined history books remembering him for ending America’s overseas wars. |
| Yet as much as he wanted Iraq in the rearview mirror, the swift march toward Baghdad by Islamist extremists calling themselves the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, has forced him to reconsider his approach. As much as he wanted to leave the fate of Iraq to the Iraqis themselves, he concluded that the United States still has a stake in avoiding the collapse of a state it occupied for more than eight years at the cost of nearly 4,500 American lives. | Yet as much as he wanted Iraq in the rearview mirror, the swift march toward Baghdad by Islamist extremists calling themselves the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, has forced him to reconsider his approach. As much as he wanted to leave the fate of Iraq to the Iraqis themselves, he concluded that the United States still has a stake in avoiding the collapse of a state it occupied for more than eight years at the cost of nearly 4,500 American lives. |
| “We have an interest in making sure that a group like I.S.I.L., which is a vicious organization and has been able to take advantage of the chaos in Syria, that they don’t get a broader foothold,” Mr. Obama said on Friday, using an alternative name for the group, the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. “There are dangers of fierce sectarian fighting if, for example, the terrorist organizations try to overrun sacred Shia sites, which could trigger Shia-Sunni conflicts that could be very hard to stamp out.” | “We have an interest in making sure that a group like I.S.I.L., which is a vicious organization and has been able to take advantage of the chaos in Syria, that they don’t get a broader foothold,” Mr. Obama said on Friday, using an alternative name for the group, the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. “There are dangers of fierce sectarian fighting if, for example, the terrorist organizations try to overrun sacred Shia sites, which could trigger Shia-Sunni conflicts that could be very hard to stamp out.” |
| Stepping back, he cited the United States’ own tortured history in Iraq and the desire not to let American efforts there go to waste. “We have enormous interests there,” he added, “and obviously our troops and the American people and the American taxpayers made huge investments and sacrifices in order to give the Iraqis the opportunity to chart a better course, a better destiny.” | Stepping back, he cited the United States’ own tortured history in Iraq and the desire not to let American efforts there go to waste. “We have enormous interests there,” he added, “and obviously our troops and the American people and the American taxpayers made huge investments and sacrifices in order to give the Iraqis the opportunity to chart a better course, a better destiny.” |
| Still, he insisted that Iraq’s leaders have to make the sorts of compromises that will bring stability to their country, and stressed that he would not let their problems consume the United States all over again. “We’re not going to allow ourselves to be dragged back into a situation in which, while we’re there, we’re keeping a lid on things” but Iraq’s own political leaders are failing to address the underlying fissures dividing the society. | Still, he insisted that Iraq’s leaders have to make the sorts of compromises that will bring stability to their country, and stressed that he would not let their problems consume the United States all over again. “We’re not going to allow ourselves to be dragged back into a situation in which, while we’re there, we’re keeping a lid on things” but Iraq’s own political leaders are failing to address the underlying fissures dividing the society. |
| Mr. Obama has long been criticized by Republicans for pulling troops out of Iraq at the end of 2011 without leaving behind a small residual force. That was a timetable originally agreed to by President George W. Bush, and Iraqi leaders at the time would not agree to immunity provisions insisted on by the Pentagon, but critics argued that Mr. Obama should have tried harder to extend the American presence. | Mr. Obama has long been criticized by Republicans for pulling troops out of Iraq at the end of 2011 without leaving behind a small residual force. That was a timetable originally agreed to by President George W. Bush, and Iraqi leaders at the time would not agree to immunity provisions insisted on by the Pentagon, but critics argued that Mr. Obama should have tried harder to extend the American presence. |
| Moreover, they said the president has not done enough to pressure Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to reconcile with the Sunni minority, and they said Mr. Obama’s failure to do more to help moderate rebels in next-door Syria has emboldened more radical Islamist forces who have spilled over into Iraq. | Moreover, they said the president has not done enough to pressure Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to reconcile with the Sunni minority, and they said Mr. Obama’s failure to do more to help moderate rebels in next-door Syria has emboldened more radical Islamist forces who have spilled over into Iraq. |
| Not only has the latest eruption in Iraq revived those criticisms, but it has also exposed the president’s plan for withdrawing from Afghanistan to further questions. Mr. Obama announced last month that he would end the combat mission there by the end of this year, leaving behind 9,800 troops, all of whom would leave by 2016. | |
| Republicans on Friday urged Mr. Obama to act decisively in Iraq, questioning why he wants to take several days to decide. “We shouldn’t have boots on the ground, but we need to be hitting these columns of terrorists marching on Baghdad with drones now,” said Representative Ed Royce of California, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. | |
| Representative Howard (Buck) McKeon of California, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said the president needed a broader strategy for containing the threat in the region. “There are no quick-fix solutions to this crisis, and I will not support a one-shot strike that looks good for the cameras but has no enduring effect,” he said. He added that the president should consider firing his national security team. | |
| From the other side of the spectrum, Democrats expressed nervousness about becoming entangled in Iraq just two and a half years after leaving. Even former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who voted for the 2003 invasion as a senator but is now positioning herself for another run for president, said she opposed the use of American force to help save the Iraqi government without assurances from Mr. Maliki. | |
| “Not at this time, no,” she said to the BBC in an interview recorded on Thursday. Mrs. Clinton, who if she ran and won would inherit the Iraq situation, said the White House should continue to reject Mr. Maliki’s request for airstrikes until he has demonstrated inclusiveness. “That is not a role for the United States,” she said of military force. | |
| Liberal activists were more vehement. “For the last 12 years, Iraq has been Bush and Cheney’s war,” said Becky Bond, the political director for an activist group called Credo. “But if the president decides to double down on George W. Bush’s disastrous decision to invade Iraq by launching a new round of bombing strikes, Iraq will become Barack Obama’s war.” | Liberal activists were more vehement. “For the last 12 years, Iraq has been Bush and Cheney’s war,” said Becky Bond, the political director for an activist group called Credo. “But if the president decides to double down on George W. Bush’s disastrous decision to invade Iraq by launching a new round of bombing strikes, Iraq will become Barack Obama’s war.” |
| That would be the last thing Mr. Obama would want. For him, Iraq has been the template of everything foreign policy should not be. He opposed the invasion as a state senator in Illinois, and many of his decisions as president have been measured against the lessons he took from Iraq. To him, the war proved that military intervention more often than not made things worse, not better. | |
| When he agreed to send more troops to Afghanistan, he insisted on a timetable for pulling them out. When he decided to intervene in Libya, he used only air power and made sure that NATO allies took the lead. When the Syrian civil war broke out, he resisted calls to step in even with air power or, for a long time, arms for the rebels. The longer he has been in office, the more skeptical he seems to grow about the utility of force as a means of changing the world for the better. | |
| Even as he acknowledged on Friday the possibility of using force again in Iraq, he put the onus on Mr. Maliki and other Iraqi leaders to set aside sectarian differences and stabilize their country. “The United States will do our part,” he said, “but understand that ultimately it’s up to the Iraqis, as a sovereign nation, to solve their problems.” | |
| Still, those who have spent time around Mr. Obama heard deep frustration in his voice as he spoke about the prospect of re-engaging in Iraq. “I can only imagine what’s going through the president’s head,” said Julianne Smith, a former national security aide to Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. | Still, those who have spent time around Mr. Obama heard deep frustration in his voice as he spoke about the prospect of re-engaging in Iraq. “I can only imagine what’s going through the president’s head,” said Julianne Smith, a former national security aide to Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. |
| “He was just getting to the point where he felt he could free himself from this agenda and not define his foreign policy solely on the last guy’s,” she said. “He’s been keen not to use Bush as a reference point and get away from that and be more forward-looking and have a strategy. And he was just turning a corner when this hit.” |