Which side am I on?

As John McCain eyes the White House in '08, he is at war with himself over Bush's escalation in Iraq.

By Mark Benjamin

Read more: Republican Party, Democratic Party, U.S. Senate, Congress, John McCain, Politics, Jerry Falwell, News, Bush, Iraq, Baghdad, Iraq War, Mark Benjamin, 2008 election

AP Photo/Michel Euler

Sen. John McCain

Feb. 20, 2007 | WASHINGTON -- John McCain took to the Senate floor early this month while his colleagues were debating whether to debate a resolution condemning President Bush's plan to send nearly 21,500 more troops into Iraq. The senior Republican lawmaker has served as a proxy for Bush in the fight over the surge, and his argument on Feb. 6 fit the bill. McCain took on Majority Leader Harry Reid, who was leading the charge to pass the nonbinding resolution, with a simple message: If you believe the surge will fail, you are telling U.S. troops they will fail.

"I talked to many men and women in the military in recent days, ranking from private to general," McCain said, seeking to wrap his position in fidelity to the troops. "Isn't it true that most of them, if you had the opportunity to talk to them, would say: 'When they do not support my mission, they do not support me?'" McCain later said that the resolution might as well read: "I don't think you are going to succeed."

A war veteran and presidential contender for 2008, McCain seemed to be squarely in the president's corner during the Senate debate.

In fact, McCain has increasingly hedged his position on the surge, showing full support for Bush's plan one moment and then pivoting at another moment to point out grievous tactical errors he says are being made by the White House. For example, in front of a conservative audience at the American Enterprise Institute in January, McCain said that while the president was sending the minimum number of soldiers to Baghdad needed to make the plan work, the plan would indeed work. Then, on the Senate floor on Feb. 8, he announced that he was "very doubtful that we have enough troops" there to get the job done. Furthermore, while Bush agreed to an unconventional arrangement in which command for the surge will be split between U.S. and Iraqi military leaders, McCain warned the Senate Armed Services Committee on Jan. 23 that he knew of "no successful military operation where you have dual command." He has also suggested the Iraqis might not contribute adequately in the operation to secure Baghdad.

Political observers say McCain isn't just worried about military tactics. By simultaneously endorsing the surge and harshly criticizing certain aspects of the Bush plan as potentially disastrous, McCain appears to be hedging his bets should the surge fail. "He is looking for an exit strategy if it does not work," said Stephen Wayne, a political science professor at Georgetown University. "It says: 'You just did not do it right, Mr. President.'"

McCain's support for the escalation is consistent with his long-held belief that the United States has been short on troops in Iraq from the beginning. But some political observers have noted that it also buttresses McCain's recent, sometimes awkward efforts to cozy up to the GOP's conservative base before the upcoming Republican primaries.

It could be a risky gambit, pitting him against the broader general electorate, which, polls show, is opposed to the surge. "McCain is really in a tough position at the moment," noted Wayne. "If the surge fails and McCain is attached to it, it is going to be very difficult to run in the general election."

At times, McCain has come across as one of the Senate's harshest critics of the surge plan's tactics, stopping just short of predicting failure in Baghdad. He has certainly been far more critical of its tactical aspects than Bush's other main ally in the Senate, Connecticut's Joe Lieberman, who has stuck to unflagging endorsements of Bush's war policy.

Should Bush's plan fail, observers say, McCain is positioning himself as the man who would have had the right plan to win the war. "That is the way he is going to sell it," explained Michele Swers, a political science professor at Georgetown. "He would have done it right."

But this approach clouds McCain's argument that doubters of the surge don't support the troops. Other lawmakers -- including some Republicans -- have opposed the surge in part because they worry that the plan will fail. They say the best way to support the troops is to encourage the president to pursue other initiatives they believe are more likely to salvage the situation, including a renewed diplomatic effort in the region. "A surge was already tried in Baghdad last fall, and it failed," Jim Ramstad, R-Minn., stated on the House floor last Wednesday. "It's time for a surge in diplomacy, not a surge in troops, to mend a broken country."

In a brief interview just outside the Senate chamber last Tuesday, McCain sought to draw a distinction between his concerns about possible failure and the concerns of his colleagues who oppose the surge altogether. "They are saying that it will fail, because if you thought it would succeed, obviously, you would support it," McCain explained. "I think it can succeed. I believe it will," he said. "But I am by no means sure. As I've said, there are many uncertainties here."

That outlook contrasts with McCain's message when he and Lieberman established themselves as Bush's tag team on the surge during the January event at the American Enterprise Institute. Ensconced in a plush suite along with some of the White House's ideological kin, McCain argued there was a parallel between those opposed to the Baghdad plan and American isolationists prior to World War I. He also referenced the unconscionable failure to act early against fascism before World War II. He even added a bit of stump-speech flair: "I am of the firm belief that the United States and the West and our values and our principles are still transcendent," he said. "Our best days are still ahead of us."

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