In his most comprehensive statement on terrorism, the Illinois senator said the Iraq war has left the U.S. less safe than it was before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and said he would seek to withdraw U.S. troops as president and shift the country’s military focus to threats in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
"When I am president, we will wage the war that has to be won," he told an audience at the Woodrow Wilson Center here. "The first step must be to get off the wrong battlefield in Iraq and take the fight to the terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan."
Obama’s warning to Musharraf drew criticism from several of his rivals for the Democratic nomination, but not from New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who said she too was prepared to launch raids across the Pakistani border if necessary to pursue terrorist targets.
The Illinois senator delivered a biting critique of President Bush’s conduct of the war in Iraq and the administration’s overall strategy for combating terrorism, while seeking to reassure Americans that his long-stated opposition to the Iraq war would not compromise his commitment to defending the country from the threat of Islamic extremists.
The muscular speech appeared aimed at inoculating himself from criticism that he lacks the toughness to lead the country in the a post-9/11 world, while attempting to show that an Obama presidency would herald an important shift in America’s approach to the world, particularly the greater Middle East.
The speech came a week after Clinton called Obama "irresponsible and frankly naive" for saying he would be prepared to meet with leaders of rogue nations without preconditions.
Much of Obama’s speech Wednesday focused on steps to reinvigorate U.S. diplomatic efforts to combat terrorism, but the most noteworthy proposals dealt with military actions.
Obama said he would deploy at least two more brigades — about 7,000 troops — to Afghanistan to combat the Taliban, while sending the Afghan government $1 billion in additional non-military aid.
But he said he would tie U.S. military aid to Pakistan to that country’s success in closing down terrorist training camps, blocking the Taliban from using its territory as a staging ground for attacks on Afghanistan and getting rid of foreign fighters.
"There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans," Obama said. "They are plotting to strike again. … If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will."
Obama offered no direct criticism of his leading rival for the Democratic nomination, but indirectly rebuked Clinton and other Democrats who voted for the 2002 resolution authorizing the war. "With that vote, Congress became co-author of a catastrophic war," he said.
Clinton did not respond Wednesday to the issue of her Iraq vote, but sought to show that she and Obama are not far apart on the question of dealing with terrorist threats. In an interview with American Urban Radio News Networks, she said that, if there were actionable intelligence showing Osama bin Laden or other prominent terrorist leaders in Pakistan, "I would ensure that they were targeted and killed or captured." She also said she long has favored sending more troops to Afghanistan.
Other Democratic candidates took issue Obama’s tough talk on Pakistan.
"It is dangerous and irresponsible to leave even the impression the United States would needlessly and publicly provoke a nuclear power," Connecticut Sen. Christopher Dodd said in a statement.
New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, in a telephone interview, said Obama’s threat, if acted upon, could inflame the entire Muslim world. "My international experience tells me that we should address this issue with tough diplomacy first with Musharraf and then leave the military option as a last resort," he said.
Former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, in a statement, said he would first apply "maximum diplomatic and economic pressure on states like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia" to do their utmost to combat the spread of terrorism. He also challenged both Obama and Clinton to block a proposed U.S. arms deal with the Saudis.