For the second time in almost as many weeks, an important leader from a country the US is militarily involved with has agreed with Senator Obama's assessment and plans to deal with the current situation. First it was Iraq's Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, who said he agreed with Obama's approximate 16-month timetable to withdraw troops, and now Afghan's Ambassador to the US, Said Jawad, has stated that Obama's proposed increased support to rid Afghanistan of terrorists, especially on the Pakistan border, is what his country needs.
Those who keep repeating the meme that Senator Obama is too inexperienced are looking rather "inexperienced" themselves. When two leaders of the countries where the US is militarily involved acknowledge that Obama knows what he's talking about, and, what is more, agree with his policies, that negates accusations that Obama doesn't know enough about foreign policy. He does. And the Iraqi and Afghan leaders agree.
"Afghanistan's Ambassador to the United States trumpeted major portions of Barack Obama's approach towards his country on Tuesday, marking the second time in as many weeks that an official at the center of U.S.-Mideast policy has echoed the Illinois Senator's agenda.
Said Jawad, who has been at the ambassador's post since 2003, avoided specific references to Obama and his rival Sen. John McCain. But on a broad range of issues that divide the two candidates -- defining the main battleground in the war on terror, U.S. military commitments to Afghanistan, and combating terrorist activity in Pakistan -- he agreed with the prescriptions of the presumptive Democratic nominee.
Sipping occasionally from a glass of mint-flavored iced tea, the ambassador argued that the war in Iraq had diverted military and material resources from Afghanistan. He described the border his country shared with Pakistan as "the central front of the war on terror, certainly," stressing the need for additional American forces. And he offered what amounted to a heartfelt endorsement of Obama's proposal to target high-level al Qaeda figures in northwest Pakistan, even without that country's acquiescence.
"We would appreciate it if Pakistan could take full responsibility in dealing with them," he said. "But if they can't, if they don't have the resources, they should allow the international community to take these elements out, for the sake of Pakistan, for the sake of Afghanistan, and for the sake of the world. These are criminals. We should allow the humanity to go out and eliminate these enemies of humanity. We should not fool ourselves with the legal questions such as sovereignty."
Obama and McCain have differed on this policy, with the Arizona Republican accusing his opponent of naivete and inexperience for proposing to "bomb" an ally. The two candidates have also parted paths on the best way to address the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan, which this month has seen more deaths of U.S. service members than Iraq. Obama has called for the reallocation of two-to-three brigades of troops from the latter war to the former - a "short-term surge" that Jawad, likewise, advocated.
"From the very beginning the U.S. and international community around Afghanistan was following a policy known as a light footprint, which I see as the wrong policy. We needed the right footprint for Afghanistan," said the ambassador. Now, he added, Afghanistan "will require the surge of both military resources and competence."
McCain, in contrast, has said he would encourage NATO countries to commit more forces to Afghanistan -- a proposal that Jawad said would be important but ultimately insufficient.
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