Throughout his bid for the Democratic Party's presidential nomination, Barack Obama has touted his early opposition to war with Iraq as evidence of his superior judgement in comparison to Hillary Clinton's, who voted for the resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq in 2002.
During last Thursday's Democratic presidential debate, Obama put it this way:
[T]he legislation, the authorization had the title, an authorization to use U.S. military force, U.S. military force, in Iraq. I think everybody, the day after that vote was taken, understood this was a vote potentially to go to war.
I think were very clear about that. That's the -- if you look at the headlines.
The reason that this is important, again, is that Senator Clinton, I think, fairly, has claimed that she's got the experience on day one. And part of the argument that I'm making in this campaign is that, it is important to be right on day one.
And that the judgment that I've presented on this issue, and some other issues is relevant to how we're going to make decisions in the future. You know, it's not a function just of looking backwards, it's a function of looking forwards and how are we going to be making a series of decisions in a very dangerous world.
As evidence of his claim that he was "right on day one" about Iraq, Obama frequently points to a speech he delivered on October 26, 2002 in which he said:
I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al-Qaeda.
I am not opposed to all wars. I’m opposed to dumb wars.
But there's another portion of the speech that has received little attention from the news media and his opponents for the Democratic nomination, and yet a simple question based on that statement may reveal more about Obama's judgement than his outright opposition to war with Iraq.
After declaring his opposition to "dumb wars" Obama says this:
You want a fight, President Bush? Let’s fight to make sure that the UN inspectors can do their work ...
Fight! Fight how?
How would Barack Obama have created an international consensus and compelled Sadam Hussien to acquiesce, in order to put inspectors back into Iraq without a threat of the use force?
It's important to remember that the United Nations Security Council had been deadlocked throughout the Summer and Fall of that year regarding the return of weapons inspectors to Iraq, and it was not until the Iraq resolution was passed by Congress (October 10, 2002) that the diplomatic logjam was broken and the Security Council passed Resolution 1441 which imposed tough new arms inspections on Iraq (November 8, 2002). Would China, France and Russia have been as willing to compromise had the congressional resolution failed?
And even if the holdouts on the Security Council did magically change their positions without passage of the resolution, would Saddam have allowed the inspectors back into Iraq without the threat of military action hanging over him? To believe that Saddam would have capitulated under such circumstances, as Obama seems to, is the real fairy tale that should be at issue here.
If Obama stands by his statement that he wanted to put weapons inspectors back into Iraq, it seems to me that it's incumbent upon him to explain specifically how he would have accomplished this goal without threatening the use of force.
