Obama, Romney wrangle over foreign policy

BOCA RATON, Florida

REUTERS Photo

U.S. President Barack Obama sharply challenged Republican rival Mitt Romney over foreign policy on Oct. 22, as the two presidential rivals squared off in their third and final debate with the race in a dead heat two weeks before elections.

“I know you haven’t been in a position to actually execute foreign policy, but every time you’ve offered an opinion, you’ve been wrong,” President Obama told his foe, coming out swinging in the debate in Boca Raton, Florida. Romney responded that “attacking me is not an agenda” for dealing with a dangerous world. He accused Obama of sending the wrong signals to Iran’s leaders by showing weakness in the Middle East.

Both candidates underscored their support for Israel against a threat from Iran. “If Israel is attacked, we have their back,” said Romney, moments after Obama vowed, “I will stand with Israel if Israel is attacked.”

Neither candidate scored a knockout punch in the debate, as both men reined in the confrontational sniping. Romney played it safe, avoiding any catastrophic error that would have undermined his bid to be commander-in-chief, but was often on the defensive, apart from when lambasting Obama over the struggling economy.

‘Syria opportunity’

According to two instant polls released by CNN and CBS News, Obama “won” the debate. CBS News said that its poll of 521 undecided voters said the president had won the night by a 53 percent to 23 percent margin over his counterpart. CNN said Obama won by eight percentage points among the debate watchers it polled, 48 percent to 40 percent. Republican candidate Romney actually backed much of the substance of President Obama’s global strategy. He endorsed Obama’s decision to withdraw from Afghanistan in 2014, supported the president’s lethal drone war against terror suspects, and congratulated him on hunting down Osama bin Laden.

Both agreed that in Syria President Bashar al-Assad would not survive. Obama said there was no difference between the two on policy towards Syria except that Romney wanted to send heavy weapons to the rebels. Romney said the U.S. should be arming the “responsible” rebels. “Syria is an opportunity for us … We should be playing the leadership role,” he said. That precipitated a quick response from Obama, who pointed to U.S. efforts to organize international efforts to address the issue, as well as its support for opposition factions. “We are making sure that those we help will be our friends [in the future],” he said. Over China, Romney vowed to press Beijing harder on trade and currency issues but toned down earlier rhetoric, following warnings that his approach could spark a trade war.

Obama described his opponent twice as “wrong and reckless” and accused him of being “all over the map” on his foreign policy positions. Obama said Romney would reinstate the unpopular foreign policies of President George W. Bush and jabbed at Romney’s comments during the campaign that Russia is the United States’ “number one geopolitical foe.” “Governor, when it comes to our foreign policy, you seem to want to import the foreign policies of the 1980s, just like the social policies of the 1950s and the economic policies of the 1920s,” Obama said. Romney said that despite early hopes, the ouster of despotic regimes in Egypt, Libya and elsewhere over the past year had resulted in a “rising tide of chaos.”