Clinton Blasts Obama's Foreign Policy Readiness

Feb. 25, 2008 — -- Hoping to regain some momentum from perhaps her strongest political asset, her perceived experience, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., delivered a foreign policy speech in Washington, D.C., this afternoon that assailed rival Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., as unwise, inexperienced, impulsive and indecisive — in short, a risk to the nation.

Clinton said that Obama "wavers from seeming to believe that mediation and meetings without preconditions can solve some of the world's most intractable problems to advocating rash unilateral military action without cooperation among allies in the most sensitive region of the world."

With a half-dozen retired generals standing behind her, Clinton said she was the only candidate who could restore a U.S. foreign policy that had the right combination of diplomacy and military might.

A sign on the podium proclaimed her election "Strengthening America."

To a packed auditorium at George Washington University, Clinton seemed to imply Obama's lack of foreign policy credentials might mean he'd be a Democratic version of President Bush.

"We've seen the tragic result of having a president who had neither the experience nor the wisdom to manage our foreign policy and safeguard our national security," she said. "We can't let that happen again."

Clinton also mocked Obama by implication suggesting he would need a manual to understand the complexities of foreign diplomacy.

"The American people don't have to guess whether I understand the issues or whether I would need a foreign policy instruction manual to guide me through a crisis, or whether I'd have to rely on advisers to introduce me to global affairs," she said.

She directly criticized two facets of Obama's foreign policy proposals from the last year.

On Obama's suggestion he would meet with the leaders of nations hostile to the United States, she said, "We simply cannot legitimize rogue regimes or weaken American prestige by impulsively agreeing to presidential-level talks that have no preconditions. It may sound good … but it doesn't meet the real world test of foreign policy."