Obama-Jones?

By Brian Faughnan
Published June 10, 2008 7:30pm ET
Add Washington Examiner on Google

Chuck Todd reports that Jim Johnson and Eric Holder are asking Hill Democrats their views about General Jim Jones as a possible vice presidential nominee. Todd probably reads too much into the significance of this, given that Johnson and Holder are only tangentially related to the Obama campaign — just volunteers, really. Nevertheless, the report is sparking speculation that the former supreme allied commander in Europe might be on Obama’s short list. The Wall Street Journal printed a profile on Jones a little over a year ago, labeling him as the next great ‘get,’ and comparing him to Eisenhower:

Gen. Jones has become the ultimate catch for either party because he so well captures the current political zeitgeist on security and America’s image abroad. He’s a worldly, tough-minded former Marine commandant who has criticized former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s handling of the Iraq war, saying that the U.S. failed to prepare “for the day after Saddam’s statue fell down.” At the same time he advocates a sharply more centrist foreign policy than the Bush administration’s, asserting that America’s image has suffered in recent years, and must be repaired…

Another interesting fact about Jones is who his first boss was in the U.S. Senate:

In 1979, Gen. Jones became a Marine liaison to the Senate, where his first boss was Sen. McCain, at the time a Navy captain. Witnessing the Republican takeover of the Senate in 1981, for the first time in decades, “taught me a lesson in bipartisanship,” he says.

Go read the Journal piece; they point out that Jones has friends who are Republicans and Democrats, and each seems to agree that Jones is ‘one of them.’ Most recently, Jones served as President Bush’s envoy for Middle East Security. Wouldn’t it be hard for Obama to critique President Bush’s foreign policy if he took as his running mate someone who recently helped implement it? Even if that was not too problematic, picking Jones would certainly make it more difficult for Obama to explain his position on the surge. That’s because Jones also headed up the independent commission created by Congress to assess the progress of Iraqi security forces. On September 6, 2007, the commission issued a report that credited the Bush administration’s surge and new direction with significant progress:

The Iraqi armed forces-Army, Special Forces, Navy, and Air Force-are increasingly effective and are capable of assuming greater responsibility for the internal security of Iraq; and the Iraqi police are improving, but not at a rate sufficient to meet their essential security responsibilities. The Iraqi Security Forces will continue to rely on the Coalition to provide key enablers such as combat support (aviation support, intelligence, and communications), combat service support (logistics, supply chain management, and maintenance), and training. The Commission assesses that in the next 12 to 18 months there will be continued improvement in their readiness and capability…

Jones was also pretty clear in his opposition to a precipitous drawdown in the near future:

Those three things [improvements in the Iraqi military, the Anbar awakening, and the tactical success of the surge] happening simultaneously give us a reason to believe that, as this army continues to develop and as the needed reforms in the police are implemented, that we can start considering reassessing, perhaps even re-missioning some of our forces to focus some of our capabilities away from the cities and onto the borders. We’re very concerned by what we’ve learned about the increasing Iranian destabilization efforts in the southern part of the country, the continuing problems along the Syrian border. And up until recently, we haven’t had that kind of operational flexibility to both focus on the internal and the external threats. We think that the emerging capabilities of the Iraqi security forces will shortly allow us to focus increasingly on the borders. And we suggest, respectfully, that consideration be given towards re-missioning, re-tasking, and that will mean some force adjustments, as well.

Exit question: if Obama’s VP search team is considering someone whose views on Iraq are so at odds with his own stated views, how well has he thought his position out? Or, how dramatically is he planning to change his views to compete in the general election? HT: Hot Air

Tag:

TWS Archive