by Frances Taylor

Created on: February 01, 2009

President Barack Obama now faces an important test of leadership-extricating the US from the war in Iraq.

Obama has been consistent in his view that the US should never have invaded Iraq, and he was one of the earliest voices on the political scene to speak out against the war when many politicians were taking the safer wait and see approach. Many of these other so-called leaders opposed the war only after it became a debacle. As an Illinois senator, Obama (and a handful of others) knew early on that the US was waging an unnecessary war of choice that was creating more enemies of America to threaten our security.

In a 2002 speech in Chicago, Obama said that he did not oppose all war, only wars that were ill conceived. "What I'm opposed to a dumb war. A rash war, a war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics," he said.

As a candidate for president, Obama often said that if he were elected, he would be "as careful getting out as we were careless getting in.'' As a consequence, Obama (and the nation) now face the reality of having to do exactly that.

During his presidential campaign, his trip overseas to both Iraq and Europe was an important turning point. Thousands of German citizens turned out to hear Obama speak and they were particularly enthusiastic about the difference between his attitudes toward the world in contrast with the Bush administration. The goodwill generated by this difference approach will be essential when Obama begins making the hard choices about Iraq and the help of other nations is needed.

Obama's trip to Iraq during the election was even more pivotal, where he and the Iraqi prime minister Maliki quickly found agreement on a timetable for US troop withdrawal from Iraq, which launched an important shift in the debate even as the Bush administration continued to claim there could be no timetable.

As president, Obama has remained consistent his position on Iraq. During his presidential transition, Obama asked Defense Secretary Robert Gates to begin a plan to with draw US troops from Iraq. The agreement with Iraqi officials requires U.S. combat troops to leave Iraqi cities and towns by June 30 and to withdraw completely by the end of 2011.

The consequences of Obama's vote on Iraq have become a trajectory that has taken him from a candidate with a vision of American power to a president who must now make that vision a reality.

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