McCain's presidential bid 'linked to Iraq outcome'
Arizona senator John McCain, his presidential bid faltering and his support for the unpopular Iraq war unflinching, is seeking to convince Americans that the conflict is “necessary and just”.
“I know the pain war causes. I understand the frustration caused by our mistakes in this war,” the former Vietnam prisoner of war says in a speech to be delivered today. “But I also know the toll a lost war takes on an army and a country.”
All three leading Republican presidential candidates back President Bush’s decision earlier this year to dispatch additional troops to Baghdad. But McCain, long an advocate of more forces, is the only one directly linked to the policy, and, by extension, the war.
Supporters of the increase, McCain said, have chosen a hard road. “But it is the right road,” he said.
“We have a long way to go, but for the first time in four years, we have a strategy that deals with how things really are in Iraq and not how we wish them to be,” he said, urging patience.
McCain, a critic of how the war has been waged, is staking his presidential candidacy on its outcome – for better or worse. “I would rather lose a campaign than a war,” he said.
While visiting Iraq last week, McCain said he was encouraged by signs of progress and cautiously optimistic about security improvements in Baghdad even as he toured the capital under heavy military guard. Iraqis mocked his characterisation as too rosy, and he faced criticism at home for being out of touch with reality.
The episode threatened to undercut McCain’s credibility on one of his signature issues – defence. A former Navy pilot held captive in Vietnam for nearly six years, McCain is the only top-tier Republican candidate to have served in the military. He is the senior Republican on the Senate Armed Services Committee.
In his speech at the Virginia Military Institute, McCain stresses the consequences of failure in Iraq and explains his staunch support of the war, now in its fifth year, which has caused more than 3,200 American lives.
“Our defeat in Iraq would constitute a defeat in the war against terror and extremism and would make the world a much more dangerous place,” McCain said, chastising Democrats in Congress pushing for withdrawal for advocating what he equates to surrender.
McCain’s Iraq speech is the first of three major policy addresses he plans to give as he seeks to inject much-needed momentum into his campaign.
