Obama referred repeatedly to the US engagement in Afghanistan, noting that he chose West Point as the venue for unveiling his new Afghanistan strategy six months ago. But he also used his speech to speak about the seven-year war in Iraq in a way that may have been bittersweet for former president George Bush.
This is what success looks like, he said, noting that departing US combat troops will leave behind a democratic and sovereign Iraq that is no haven for the kind of violent extremists that attacked the US on Sept. 11, 2001. President Obama, May 22, 2010 See Link