Concord Monitor: Biden Has Plan to End 'National Tragedy'

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Concord Monitor: Biden Has Plan to End 'National Tragedy'

By SHIRA SCHOENBERG

Presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden yesterday warned voters that the president has led the country into "a deep hole" at home and abroad because of his policy in Iraq. Biden outlined his own proposal for ending the war, which would create a federal system of government dividing Iraq along ethnic lines.

"Until you deal with Iraq, the president is limited in terms of his flexibility and credibility to deal with other problems," Biden said yesterday. "You've got to shovel the sidewalk before you get to the driveway. It's sucking up significant resources and is a national tragedy."

Although Biden, a 54-year-old Democratic senator from Delaware, lacks the star appeal of Sens. Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton, supporters say that his knowledge and experience, as a senator since 1972 and head of the Senate's Foreign Relations Committee, are just what the country needs during wartime.

"It's not about rock star. It's about rock solid," said State Rep. Jim Ryan, who heard Biden speak at Granite State Independent Living Center in Concord and is deciding whether to support Biden or New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson.

Biden was in New Hampshire to kick off a series of nationwide "town hall meetings," where he will try to gain support for his presidential bid and his plan for Iraq. In visits to Concord and to New England College in Henniker, Biden told voters that "America finds itself more isolated in the world than at any time in American history."
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Biden and Leslie Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations, have proposed a five-step plan for ending the war in Iraq.

The plan would give Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds their own regions while putting a central government in charge of defending borders and distributing oil revenues. Biden said the system makes sense because 92 percent of Iraqi voters cast their ballots along sectarian lines during elections. Sunnis, who have no oil in their region, would receive a portion of revenue based on their population. Oil-rich Arab Gulf states would be asked to pay for Iraqi reconstruction, and the U.S. would enlist the UN Security Council and Iraq's Muslim neighbors in a diplomatic initiative to support the plan. The plan aims for the U.S. to withdraw its troops by 2008, leaving a force of 15,000 to 30,000 soldiers to protect local forces and fight a terrorist takeover.

Biden said the plan is similar to one that worked in the Balkans, where he said he saw genocide firsthand before the country was divided along ethnic lines. The alternative, he said, is either long-term occupation or dictatorship. Biden said his plan would cost one-fifth or one-sixth of the war's current price - which, he said, is $8.5 billion a month.

Biden also proposed voluntary national service, where men and women between ages 18 and 21 could choose to spend six months in the military, a year in the Peace Corps or two years volunteering domestically, in exchange for assistance with college tuition.

"Of all the candidates running on the Democratic side, he has the most developed plan for Iraq," said Wayne Lesperance, an associate professor of political science at New England College. "If the president's surge doesn't work, we're left with only a couple of options, and one is what Biden has outlined."

Although Biden voted to authorize the use of force in Iraq in 2002, he has become a fierce critic of the president's handling of the war . He plans to introduce legislation to repeal that authorization and replace it with a narrower mission for U.S. troops.

"We're not left with many good choices because of the ineptitude with which the war was waged - it was premature, unnecessary and waged with an arrogance regarding our power and the history of Iraq that defied reason," Biden said.

The next president, Biden said, will have "no margin of error." He or she "will have to immediately figure out how to extricate us from Iraq and turn to other hot spots in the world before they explode." He spoke of threats from the "axis of oil," which includes Iran and Russia. Iran and North Korea have potential nuclear capabilities, and Russia has taken a totalitarian tilt, he said.

"It is not enough to surround yourself with smart people," Biden said. "You better be as smart and as informed as the smart people you gather around you. It can't be on-the-job training."

Biden also spent time talking about restoring the middle class, another pillar of his campaign, and discussed funding for higher education, access to affordable health care and rights for those with disabilities.

Biden attracted about 50 attendees in Concord and close to 200 in Henniker. Although most voters were undecided, several said they appreciated Biden's straightforwardness and willingness to answer their questions in detail.

"I'm amazed at his ability to be sensitive to every issue that matters to me," said Don Robar, 70, a retired college professor. "He understands global as well as local."

NEC student Danny Reiter, 21, said he could potentially vote for Biden. "His plan for Iraq is a plan, and no one else has a plan," he said. "It's more detailed than add or withdraw troops - that's part of a plan, but not a whole plan."

Fellow NEC student Jonathan Waite, 22, who has a brother in the U.S. Navy, liked Biden's plan because it would reduce the number of troops in Iraq. "The less troops, that's a lot of family members safe and sound," he said.

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