During President Obama’s almost six months in office, support for two key aspects of his national security policy has been greater on the right than on the left. This fact has been curiously underreported.
On Afghanistan, conservatives were quicker than their counterparts on the left to praise and defend President Obama’s decision to send an additional 21,000 troops to Afghanistan. On Iraq, they hailed his willingness to go back on a campaign pledge and modify his timeline for troop withdrawals from sixteen to nineteen months.
On the left, Obama’s policies were greeted with concern about Afghanistan becoming “Obama’s Vietnam” and the formation of a “Get out of Afghanistan” caucus made up of the remnants of the “Get out of Iraq” caucus. Key Democrats have threatened to impose benchmarks and limit funding for the war in Afghanistan if progress is not made within a year.
Despite this support from Republicans who want to ensure that the United States does not desert Iraq or Afghanistan before the job is done, recent comments by Obama administration officials indicate that the administration’s approach may not continue to be so worthy of praise.
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