Hillary Clinton's Iraq vision: A Reduced but significant military force in Iraq  15.3.2007

We would not be trying to insert ourselves in the middle between the various Shiite and Sunni factions. I do not think that's a smart or achievable mission for American forces. Clinton has said she would vote for a proposed Democratic resolution on Iraq that calls for U.S. troop withdrawal in 2008. She said the resolution calls for a limited number to troops to stay in Iraq for protection, training and counter-terrorism operations.

Part of the transcript of interview with Senator Clinton

Q. If you were to be elected president, what specific steps would you take to try to bring a close to the conflict?

SENATOR HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON: Well obviously I’ve thought a lot about this. And of course the choices that one would face are neither good nor unlimited. We’re in a very difficult situation that has been made worse by the failures of the administration. So what will be inherited is not completely clear, but likely to be:

Continuing sectarian violence; no real resolution of the political disagreements on the ground among the Iraqis; an unsettled if not unstable region, trying to figure out what the roles they want to play in regard to Iraq might be; a beachhead of Sunni insurgents and Al Qaeda operatives; the Turks being concerned about what is happening among the Kurds.

There’s a long litany of very difficult challenges. What I’m hoping is that with the slight change in policy that I am detecting in the Bush administration, that perhaps some progress could be made over the next nearly two years. Certainly, the willingness to engage Iran and Syria could possibly lead to some changes that would be beneficial to the overall structure of the situation we confront.

The surge, which is ongoing, and obviously if we’re going to do it we hope it is more successful than perhaps I think it could be.
...

I think we have a vital national security interest and obligation to try to help the Kurds manage their various problems in the north so that one of our allies, Turkey, is not inflamed, and they are able to continue with their autonomy. I think we have a vital national security interest — if the Iraqis ever get their act together — to continue to provide logistical support, air support, training support. I don’t know that that is going to be feasible, but I would certainly entertain it. And I think we have a continuing vital national security interest in trying to prevent Iran from crossing the border and having too much influence inside of Iraq.

Those are all different moving pieces on the chess board. And from the vantage point of where I sit now, I can tell you, in the absence of a very vigorous diplomatic effort on the political front and on the regional and international front, I think it is unlikely there’s going to be a stable situation that will be inherited.

And so it will be up to me to try to figure out how to protect those national security interests and continue to take our troops out of this urban warfare, which I think is a loser, and I do not believe that it can be successful. If we had done it right from the beginning, we might have had a fighting chance. We did not, and I think it is beyond our control now.

But what we can do is to almost take a line sort of north of, between Baghdad and Kirkuk, and basically put our troops into that region — the ones that are going to remain for our antiterrorism mission; for our northern support mission; for our ability to respond to the Iranians; and to continue to provide support, if called for, for the Iraqis.

nytimes com   

Top