Iraqi Official: Obama Believes This is Bush's War & Must End in Lack of Success If Not Actual Defeat

According Amir Taheri, a noted authority on Middle East affairs, the Iraqi officials were not very impressed with the antiwar Illinois senator and said that Obama’s analysis is “way off the mark.”

The US soldiers stationed in Iraq don’t look so thrilled to be sitting with the the Far Left senator who still cannot admit the surge was a great success despite the incontrovertible evidence.

Democratic presidential nominee, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, speaks with and enjoys breakfast with Lt. Col. Miguel Hobbs, a native of Columbia, Ill.; Spc. Anthony Graziani, a native of Chicago Heights, Ill.; and Sgt. Marquita Hollins of Chicago, Ill., at a dining facility in Baghdad’s International Zone, July 22, 2008. The Soldiers serve with the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), Multi-National Division – Baghdad. (DVIDS)

Taheri’s sources make Obama sound as loony and nuts as he did during the Couric interview.
Amir Taheri at The New York Post reported:

“He looked like a man in a hurry,” a source close to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said last week. “He was not interested in what we had to say.”

Still, many Iraqis liked Obama’s claim that the improved situation in Iraq owed to Iraqi efforts rather than the Gen. David Petraeus-led surge. In public and private comments, Obama tried to give the impression that the Iraqis would’ve achieved the same results even without the greater resources America has poured into the country since 2007.

In private, though, Iraqi officials admit that Obama’s analysis is “way off the mark.” Without the surge, the Sunni tribes wouldn’t have switched sides to help flush out al Qaeda. And the strong US military presence enabled the new Iraqi army to defeat Iran-backed Shiite militias in Basra and Baghdad.

Nevertheless, in public at least, no Iraqi politician wants to appear more appreciative of American sacrifices than the man who may become the next US president.

Iraqis were most surprised by Obama’s apparent readiness to throw away all the gains made in Iraq simply to prove that he’d been right in opposing the 2003 overthrow of Saddam Hussein. “He gave us the impression that the last thing he wanted was for Iraq to look anything like a success for the United States,” a senior Iraqi official told me. “As far as he is concerned, this is Bush’s war and must end in lack of success, if not actual defeat.”

Even so, Obama knows that most Americans believe they’re still at war with an enemy prepared to use terror against them. So he can’t do what his antiwar base wants – declare an end to the War on Terror and the start of a period of love and peace in which “citizens of the world” build bridges between civilizations.

Having announced his strategy before embarking on his “listening tour,” he couldn’t be expected to change his mind simply because facts on the ground offered a different picture.

In Paris, a friendly reporter asked the Illinois senator if there was anything that he’d heard or seen during his visit that might persuade him to alter any aspect of his polices. Obama’s answer was clear: no.

Of course, most of us already knew that Obama and his Democratic colleagues were dead set against winning this war in Iraq.
This is just further confirmation.

Photo of author
Jim Hoft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016. In 2023, The Gateway Pundit received the Most Trusted Print Media Award at the American Liberty Awards.

You can email Jim Hoft here, and read more of Jim Hoft's articles here.

 

Thanks for sharing!