Republican candidates in fierce foreign policy battle _ Sat night debate in N.H.

Breitbart.com ^ | Jan 5 09:11 PM US/Eastern | Staff

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Republican presidential candidates squabbled heatedly on US foreign policy on Saturday, as anger boiled over in a high-stakes debate just three days before the New Hampshire primary.

Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor who won the Iowa caucuses on Thursday, was forced to defend his previous remark that the foreign policy of the administration of President George W. Bush was "arrogant."

His rival Mitt Romney, who badly needs a victory in Tuesday's primary, took Huckabee to task as the two also battled over their records on Iraq and national security.

"There were times when we gave the world the impression that we were going to ignore what they thought or what they felt," Huckabee said.

"I am not running for George Bush's third term, I want to be president of the United States on my own terms," he said.

Huckabee singled out former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld for particular criticism, accusing him of sending too few troops to Iraq.

"We don't let the politicians interfere or interrupt the battlefield decisions of the commanders with blood on their boots and medals on their chest," he said.

The exchanges on Iraq took a nasty turn when Romney accused Huckabee of mischaracterizing his position and Huckabee shot back, "which one?"

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

From the NY Times:

In a Spirited Republican Debate, Romney Finds Himself a Target

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MANCHESTER, N.H. — It was five against one, or maybe one against five: Mitt Romney skirmished with each of his Republican rivals on Saturday night during a fiery debate here that was marked with repeated attacks that sometimes dripped with scorn.

He tangled with Senator John McCain of Arizona, his main rival in New Hampshire, over immigration. He traded barbs with Mike Huckabee, a former Arkansas governor, on foreign policy.

Fred D. Thompson, a former senator from Tennessee, sparred with him on health care. Rudolph W. Giuliani, a former mayor of New York, poked fun at his penchant for running negative ads. And he even debated Representative Ron Paul of Texas on foreign policy.

Mr. Romney, who was set back by his upset defeat in the Iowa caucuses last week and is now placing his hopes on a strong showing in the New Hampshire primary on Tuesday, found himself waging something of a five-front war.

The stakes in the debate were highest for Mr. Romney and for Mr. McCain, who both badly want a victory on Tuesday, and they ended up having some of the most spirited exchanges of the night.

[Huck]

Huckabee singled out former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld for particular criticism, accusing him of sending too few troops to Iraq.

This isn't even a debatable point anymore, is it? Of course, if Rumsfeld is to blame, then to some degree, so is GWB, but at least GW did eventually can Rumsfeld. And then we got more troops, Petreus, the surge, a change in fortunes. Isn't all that true?

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Not sure how to comment ...but you might find this of interest:

How al Qaeda Used the Media and the Democrats and Almost Won the War

[Huck]

Thanks I’ll try to give it a read.

[claudiustg]

-—This isn’t even a debatable point anymore, is it?-—

It is debatable. We sent enough troops in to win the war. We were blocked by the Turks in the north else victory would have been even quicker. The asumetion was that we would accept the surrender of large formations of enemy troops and that the police would remain intact. These would have been used to keep the peace with the civilian population. This didn’t happen and that’s when the trouble started.

Here’s an interesting aside about Vietnam at the end of WWII. A small British force was sent in to accept the British surrender. They freed the imprisoned French police, who immediately started taking revenge on the Vietnamese population that they felt had betrayed and mistreated them. The British were forced to rearm the Japanese and use them as a police force until troops could be brought in from outside.

[kingu]

Fred, Rudy and Paul don’t rate mention in an article about the debates? So nice of the media to choose who our candidates are.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Always remember they have an Agenda....

[Huck]

Well, I’m no expert. Not anywhere near it. But that sounds like woulda, coulda, shouda. I know there were people saying we needed roughly the amount of extra troops we eventually got. Hell, lot of folks here complained for a long time that we weren’t fighting the war to win, we were picking around, retaking the same towns over and over, etc. It sure seems like after Rummy got canned, we got a new strategy and it worked.

[claudiustg]

I see what you’re saying. The critics though were saying we didn’t have enough forces to begin with. True though there was a certain incompetence to the post war security, but you see the same things everywhere from construction projects to medical treatments. I think going with Gen. Petraeus was the big change.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

From the same source:

GOP Candidates Back Bush Terror Strategy

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

From the article linked at post #11,

Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani said Bush "got the big decision of his presidency right ... when he put us on offense against Islamic terrorists."

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

From the JAWA Report:

Congrats to Fred Thompson!!!

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After beating expectations and finishing third in the Iowa caucuses earlier this week, Fred Thompson just took second place in the Wyoming caucuses. This showing nets him 3 delegates--which is 3 more delegates than Rudy or McCain have.

Here's Fred from tonight's debate, calling it like he sees it...

Go Fred!!!
By Ragnar Danneskjold, R.I.N.O. Hunter at January 6, 2008 12:51 AM | | l digg this

****************************************

Go to the link for the video.

Fred and Rudy in regard to the amnesty of the Immigration Bill that failed...

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

We had enough Forces initially....but we didn’t know that Saddam and al-Queda had a secret plan....the Insurgency....

[MarkDel]

And Rudy is absolutely right. Bush may have missed a few details along the way, but the big decision was 100% correct and took a level of political courage that only THREE of the current Republican candidates would have had they been in the same position...

Duncan Hunter
Rudy Guiliani
John McCain

The rest of ‘em wouldn’t have the “sack” to make the decisions Bush had to make. Unfortunately, Rudy is so wrong on social issues, and McCain nearly destroyed the country with his Campaign Finance Reform, so only Hunter is an ideal candidate...and he can’t win...

[MNJohnnie]

Except your “analysis” is pure Dincon mythology. It has no base in factual reality.

The reason the Surge is working is because Rummy resited the DC Dinocons, like McCain, demands to “Americanize” the war. He maintrained, rightly, that the Iraqis would have to take the lead on the ground in Iraq. Rummy’s mistake was to underestimate how much time the Iraqi Security Forces would need to get up and running. After the 2006 elections, when his bitterous political foes in the Democrat party were taking over the Congress, Rummy wisely fell on his sword for Bush. He did that to take away a political target for the Dems and allow the President to change the media template from a relentless fixation on what had gone wrong in Iraq to what we were going to do different now.

The fact of the matter is the ONLY people who have been wrong about Iraq are the Dincons, like McCain, who offered up luckwarm left handed support for the mission then wanted to totally screw it up by Americaning the war with 250,000 US troops. Thank God Rummy successfully defeated that stupid notion!

[MNJohnnie]

I know there were people saying we needed roughly the amount of extra troops we eventually got

That pure nonsense. The Dincons wanted to Amerize the war. People like McCain wanted an additional 250,000 US troops sent. Vastly different then the 35,000 additional troops actually sent for "The Surge"

You need to quit listening to Dincon Web Warriors who are desperately trying to defend their failed Neo Isolationist dogmas about Iraq and try actually learning some real fact about what is going on in Iraq. The Surge marries an American battalion to an Iraqi brigade to give them "on the job training". If we had listened to the Dincons you are trying to give all the credit to, those Iraqi brigades would not exist because we would have Americanized the war. Instead of the bulk of the fighting being done by the Iraqis, it would be an all American show ala Vietnam.

[Valin]

In regard to the mistakes were made arguement, I’m now reading “The Day Of Battle the war in Sicily and Italy 1943-1944”
by Rick Atkinson
All I can say is if you want to see what mistakes are I mean real honest to goodness danm near lost the war mistakes, take a look at Sicily and Italy 1943-1944.

[Huck]

We had enough Forces initially....but we didn’t know that Saddam and al-Queda had a secret plan....the Insurgency....

There were many people warning of an insurgency beforehand.

[Marine_Uncle]

As some have indicated in this post, there where those the felt an insurgency would develop. One can go around in circles all day long from one extreme to the other and probably never come to a final statement that would satisfy all concerned.
We must remember those like Chalabi had indicated the Iraqi people would be behind the invasion for the most part.
So Rummy and CENTCOM had to draw the line in the sand. How much does one plan to pay for and for how long.
And one argument often left out of the discussions where we did have a pretty good Coalition Force assembled, fully capable to take out the Iraqi military establishment.
What I don't think to much was planned for was an emerging insurgency taking the form of radical jihad (al Qaeda).
That is what changed the equation during the later part of 2004. War is not a cheap proposition. Just how much forces will be required to do a given task always carries the risk one will underestimate.
And you can bet your next case of beer, if we had sent in a few extra hundred thousand troops, the Democrates would have pissed and moaned about how the administration pissed to much money away on a short term ground and air battle.

[SunkenCiv]

Huckabee singled out former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld for particular criticism, accusing him of sending too few troops to Iraq.

...y'know, because Huckabee's a Dhimmicrat.