Guy Who Ran for President Promising to Pull Out of Iraq, Now Says It Wasn’t His Decision

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Guy Who Ran for President Promising to Pull Out of Iraq, Now Says It Wasn’t His Decision

Posted By Daniel Greenfield On August 9, 2014 @ 10:13 pm In The Point | 4 Comments



The Iraqis made that sign

If somehow Obama bin Laden’s death backfired, after exploiting it for all this time, Obama would suddenly claim he had nothing to do with it.

That’s the quality of leadership we’re dealing with. Obama is quick to take credit for everything that benefits him and quicker to run away from responsibility for anything.

For years Obama took credit for ending the Iraq War. He campaigned on a platform of pulling all the troops out in 16 months. His dovish position on Iraq is a big part of the reason why he became the Democratic nominee.

“We’ve had enough of a misguided war in Iraq that never should have been fought — a war that needs to end,” Obama said in 2007.

Now Obama wants to disavow the only reason why he’s in the White House because his position has backfired.


Today, on the South Lawn of the White House, after Obama explained why he had ordered the U.S. military to renew airstrikes in Iraq, a reporter asked Obama about his decision to remove all U.S. troops from Iraq.

“Mr. President, do you have any second thoughts about pulling all ground troops out of Iraq?” the reporter asked. “And does it give you pause as the U.S.-is it doing the same thing in Afghanistan?”

“What I just find interesting is the degree to which this issue keeps on coming up, as if this was my decision,” Obama said, indicating that he does not believe it was his decision as commander in chief of U.S. troops in a congressional authorized action in Iraq  to decide whether the troops should stay or leave.

“Under the previous administration, we had turned over the country to a sovereign, democratically elected Iraqi government,” Obama said. “In order for us to maintain troops in Iraq, we needed the invitation of the Iraqi government and we needed assurances that our personnel would be immune from prosecution if, for example, they were protecting themselves and ended up getting in a firefight with Iraqis, that they wouldn’t be hauled before an Iraqi judicial system.

“And the Iraqi government, based on its political considerations, in part because Iraqis were tired of a U.S. occupation, declined to provide us those assurances,” Obama said. “And on that basis, we left. We had offered to leave additional troops. So when you hear people say, do you regret, Mr. President, not leaving more troops, that presupposes that I would have overridden this sovereign government that we had turned the keys back over to and said, you know what, you’re democratic, you’re sovereign, except if I decide that it’s good for you to keep 10,000 or 15,000 or 25,000 Marines in your country, you don’t have a choice, which would have kind of run contrary to the entire argument we were making about turning over the country back to Iraqis, an argument not just made by me, but made by the previous administration.”

Obama’s dishonesty and hypocrisy here are mindboggling.

First of all, whatever you think of the withdrawal, Obama deliberately chose not to seriously work toward an agreement keeping troops there.

Second of all, Obama is blaming Iraq as the reason for the withdrawal and yet he completely ignored repeated pleas for air strikes by Iraq in recent months.

Air strikes that would have stopped ISIS in its tracks.

So if you believe Obama, he was only doing what Iraq wanted when he withdrew, yet ignored what Iraq wanted when ISIS was on the march.

Third of all, Obama completely ignores his history of arguing loudly for the withdrawal and claiming credit for the withdrawal.

When withdrawal was popular, it was his decision. When it became unpopular, then it’s Iraq’s decision.

Truly this man is JFK, Reagan and George Washington wrapped in one bundle.


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