McCain “Sick At Heart” Over Mistakes In Iraq War
ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico (Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate John McCain sought on Monday to distance himself from President George W. Bush’s handling of the Iraq war, telling veterans on Memorial Day he was “sick at heart” at mistakes made in the conflict now in its sixth year.
“As we all know, the American people have grown sick and tired of the war in Iraq,” McCain told hundreds of veterans and their families gathered for a ceremony honoring U.S. service members killed in conflicts.
“I understand that, of course. I, too, have been made sick at heart by the many mistakes made by civilian and military commanders and the terrible price we have paid for them,” he added.
The war is unpopular with voters, and in anticipation of facing Democratic front-runner Barack Obama in the general election in November, McCain has increasingly sought to disassociate himself from the administration’s Iraq policies.
“We have new commanders in Iraq,” McCain said to applause.
He continued with a veiled swipe at Bush: “They are following a counterinsurgency strategy that we should have been following from the beginning, which makes the most effective use of our strength and doesn’t strengthen the tactics of our enemy.”
Obama and Democrat Hillary Clinton have promised to withdraw all 155,000 U.S. troops serving in Iraq as soon as possible.
McCain criticized these plans, saying, “It would strengthen al Qaeda, empower Iran and other hostile powers in the Middle East, unleash a full scale civil war in Iraq that could quite possibly provoke genocide there, and destabilize the entire region as neighboring powers come to the aid of their favored factions.”
Earlier this month he said he believed the Iraq war can be won by 2013, leaving a functioning democracy there and allowing most U.S. troops to come home.
McCain last year backed a decision to send a further 30,000 troops to Iraq to halt a slide toward sectarian civil war in Iraq, and said the surge was “succeeding where our previous tactics failed.”
He spent much of the holiday weekend at a vacation home in Arizona with three Republicans who have been mentioned as possible vice presidential running mates: former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal.
Be respectful of others and their opinions. Inflammatory remarks and inane leftist drivel will be deleted. It ain’t about free speech, remember you’re in a private domain. My website, my prerogative.
If you can't handle using your real email address, don't bother posting a comment.
I’m sad we didn’t follow counterinsurgency before there was an insurgency also. we would have avoided a lot of the unnecessary fighting with the locals and could have focused on the real enemy -Al Qaeda and the followers of Saddam who refused to yield - years ago…..lots of soldiers and marines died because we didn’t listen to the SOF guys that knew had to fight and win COIN ops.
May 26th, 2008 at 12:40 pmWhy should the America’s enemies have yielded when the likes of Harry Ried were egging them on? How many American soldiers and Iraqis died because of the drive-by media cheering the terrorists on … and the Democrats pulling for America to lose?
Mistakes are always made in war, I doubt McANMESTY could do any better. It makes me sick in the heart the way people criticize the President.
Who would have guessed there would have been no more terror strikes on the homeland on 9/12/01 ?
May 26th, 2008 at 12:51 pmKBoom,
It aint like the top military advisers didn’t tell Rummy and the rest about counterinsurgency needs…and got “retired” for doing so. Gen. Shinseki for one.
May 26th, 2008 at 12:57 pm“Gen. Shinseki for one.”
Shinseki is a boob who thought it would take 600,000
troops to liberate Iraq (even at the height of the surge we got no where near that number). He was an old school General who wanted millions of men and thousands of tanks to fight soviet fornmations on the plains of europe, he didnt seem to have a clue about COIN and the new strategies needed for thr long war. He is deadwood like Gen. Sanchez and Gen Batiste who are better off in retirement.
Any way, glab to see McCain calling the dem aseholes to the floor for trying to suck al-Qaida and Irans nuts.
May 26th, 2008 at 1:28 pmAnyone here like Rummy? Let’s attack Iraq. But lets do it at less than half strength. Moreover lets overextend our supply convoys so that they’re easy targets. GREAT Idea. Oh and lets not launch an effective campaign against insurgents. That’s how we’re going to win this war./sarcasm.
It’s sad that it took so long in order for us to correct our mistakes. Fucking politics and Beauracracy should NOT get in the way of fighting a war. Hell in the beginning of the war we basically set ourselves up for failure. We could have and should have done/known better. But no. Words can’t describe it. Our soldiers died because of mistakes that shouldn’t have been made. You can say that there’s always mistakes, but that doesn’t change what happens or why they happened.
May 26th, 2008 at 1:29 pm/end rant
I am more sick over the behavior of our own citizens towards the men and women fighting this war. I have no doubts had our own people gotten completely behind this war effort we would not have seen the prolonging of the inevitable. Setbacks and mistakes are commonplace in war. It’s what you do when you realize your mistake.
Success is how high you bounce when you hit bottom.
May 26th, 2008 at 1:40 pm- General George Patton Jr
As Patton might have said . . .”Love the 20/20 hindsight you magnificent little maverick bastard”.
Only a couple of the books have been written. Let’s wait for a few more before we get on any bandwagons. Personally, I strongly suspect the hands of Powell and Armitage in the pot when the soup went noxious.
BTW, give me a reference where Shinseki advocated more counter-insurgency.
May 26th, 2008 at 1:44 pm[[Moreover lets overextend our supply convoys so that they’re easy targets. GREAT Idea. ]]
Shinseki:
Lets send in 400,000 un-needed troops so the supply convoys have to be huge. GREAT idea.
May 26th, 2008 at 3:10 pmSuddenly we’re all strategists in here. Leave it to the people who know what they’re doing, to at least some extent.
May 26th, 2008 at 3:36 pmPer capita troop levels that were required for the occupations of Germany and Japan should have been good initial guesses of the troop levels required for the occupation of Iraq - and I think that’s where Shinseki got his number. Also, not letting the friggin’ lawyers run the show would have helped. GW should have added two or three divisions or more to the Army right after 9/11 when he had the opportunity. In spite of this, I think Iraq will look like a cheap preview one day compared to what we will ultimately face.
May 27th, 2008 at 8:32 am