Ignatieff softens on possible extension of Afghan mission
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/War_Terror/ ... 01-cp.htmllooks like Iggy might be doing some ass kissing.
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OTTAWA - Michael Ignatieff bluntly told President Barack Obama that NATO's strategy for Afghanistan is confused and incoherent.
"I said Canadians have a sense of strategic drift there, a sense that we don't know where we're going, don't know what the plan is," Ignatieff told reporters after a 30-minute meeting with the rookie U.S. president.
"And the president said rather amusingly a lot of people in the White House feel exactly the same way."
Obama has committed 17,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan, on top of the 36,000 already there. He's also launched a 60-day strategic review of the U.S. mission.
Obama made a point during his whirlwind visit to thank Canada for its "extraordinary effort" in Afghanistan, where 108 Canadian soldiers have died in the fight against the Taliban.
He did not specifically ask Canada to extend its combat mission beyond the parliamentary-approved deadline of 2011. However, it's widely understood that he'd welcome Canada's continued military presence beyond 2011.
Ignatieff seemed to leave the door open a crack to supporting an extension, appearing to hedge when asked what he'd do should Obama succeed in persuading Prime Minister Stephen Harper to commit Canadian troops to another few years in Afghanistan.
"We cross that bridge when we come to it," he said.
"We're bound by the parliamentary resolution. I've said clearly that our party's position currently is that the military phase of the mission ends in 2011."
Ignatieff spokesperson Jill Fairbrother later said the Liberal leader has not softened his insistence that the combat component of the mission must end in 2011.
"He's said repeatedly that we're not going to change our position on that. He's been 100 per cent solid on that," she said.
Ignatieff said he told Obama he supports continued Canadian involvement in Afghanistan "on the development side, on the political side, on the diplomatic side, on the strategic side."
But he also "very directly" told the president that "you can't get us to re-up in a situation of strategic incoherence. Canadians don't know where this mission is going."
Ignatieff said he also raised the issue of Omar Khadr, the only Canadian citizen at Guantanamo Bay. He told the president that if the Liberals were in government, "we would work with him to make good on his promise to close Guantanamo down" and would repatriate Khadr to Canada.
Obama responded that "all of the cases were under review (and) it would take some time" before Khadr's fate is resolved.
Some Liberal insiders had been miffed that Ignatieff was slated to get only 15 minutes of face time with the super-star president at the tail end of his six-hour visit. They blamed Harper's office for trying to ensure that the prime minister alone got to bask in Obama's reflected glory.
But in the end the Liberal leader got almost 30 minutes with Obama, who flattered him at the outset by remarking that he'd read some of Ignatieff's books and commenting on mutual friends.
"We just kept talking. The chemistry was very good," said Liberal foreign affairs critic Bob Rae, who accompanied Ignatieff during the meeting.
Ignatieff was clearly impressed.
"I've been lucky in my life to meet famous people and some people seem smaller when you meet them. He was just as big as you think he was," Ignatieff said.
"He's a very, very big presence. He's very gracious, extremely polite, he has a gracefulness about him."
Ignatieff said he most struck by the fact that "when you talk, he listens very carefully, he locks in and then his replies are very substantial, they're very thoughtful."
The two leaders talked about their mutual interest in what Ignatieff called "the new politics" - putting aside partisanship in the midst of the economic crisis.
"This president is showing how we've got to do that and I think every politician, democratic politician in the world should take inspiration from what he's trying to do."
CKA Elite 
