The American strike in Baghdad that killed the Iranian general Qassim Suleimani thrust foreign policy to the center of the Democratic presidential race, drawing expressions of grave concern from the leading candidates and stoking a new debate in the party about the American military presence in the Middle East.
The party’s presidential field reacted to the attack with a measure of unity, at least on the surface level, condemning General Suleimani’s role directing violence against Americans but criticizing what they called the Trump administration’s penchant for reckless action and the threat of all-out war.
But during a series of campaign events on Friday, the top Democrats began to signal their differences on matters of national security, opening the way for what could become the party’s most serious conversation of the race about war and peace. Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., whose long diplomatic résumé and global stature have been seen as crucial assets to his campaign, seized the occasion to remind voters of his experience, pressing them to elect a president who could “command the world stage with no on-the-job training.”
Delivering stern remarks in Dubuque, Iowa, Mr. Biden said President Trump was risking nuclear proliferation and “direct conflict with Iran.” On Twitter, he described the president as “erratic, unstable and dangerously incompetent.”
“The threat to American lives and interests in the region and around the world are enormous,” Mr. Biden said in Iowa.
But elsewhere in the state, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont called not just for the replacement of an impulsive president but for a wholesale overhaul of American foreign policy in the Middle East. Opening a town-hall-style meeting in Anamosa, Iowa, with a somber address, Mr. Sanders urged a total military pullback from the region and noted at length that he had forcefully opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq, without explicitly mentioning that Mr. Biden had voted to authorize the war.
“We need to firmly commit to ending the U.S. military presence in the Middle East in an orderly manner, not through a tweet,” Mr. Sanders said, reiterating his past calls for a pullout from Afghanistan and an end to cooperation with Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen. “Instead of provoking more volatility in the region, the United States must use its power, its wealth and its influence to bring the regional powers to the table to resolve conflicts.”
And Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who in the past has urged a pullout of all American combat troops from the Middle East, echoed that sentiment on Twitter, warning that the country was “on the brink of yet another war” and urging Americans to mobilize against military escalation. “No more Middle East Wars,” she wrote.
Both Mr. Sanders and Ms. Warren used the word “assassination” to describe the killing of General Suleimani, a term that has significant legal and diplomatic implications. One of the prominent centrists in the race, Michael R. Bloomberg, rebuked Mr. Sanders for that description, calling it “outrageous.” He described the felled general as a fair target, questioning instead whether Mr. Trump was prepared for the fallout.
Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. said President Trump had “tossed a stick of dynamite into a tinderbox.”Credit...Brittainy Newman/The New York Times
Whether military matters come to dominate the primary, in the remaining month before the Iowa caucuses, is likely to depend on events in Iraq and Iran — and perhaps in neighboring countries — and how severe and visible any ensuing clash with Iran turns out to be. Foreign affairs have so far played a strictly limited role in the Democratic race.
There have been major debate-stage duels over health care, taxation, immigration, criminal justice and gun control, but only glancing disagreements about the role of the United States abroad and the proper way to resolve American military engagements in the Middle East and Central Asia.
On Friday, much of the Democratic field proceeded with — and recommended — caution. Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota called on the Trump administration to consult with Congress about a “strategy for preventing a wider conflict. ”And in North Conway, N.H., Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., called the Baghdad attack “an extremely provocative act,” noting that Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush had both considered but opted against attempting to kill General Suleimani.
“If we have learned nothing else from the Middle East in the last 20 years, it’s that taking out a bad guy is not a good idea unless you are ready for what’s coming next,” said Mr. Buttigieg, who referred several times to his own service in the military.
The possibility of a new and protracted conflict abroad could well reshape the general election, even beyond the Democratic race. Mr. Trump ran for president on a pledge to pull back the United States from foreign wars, drawing support from unconventional quarters for a Republican because of the perception that he would pursue an “America First” policy of relative isolationism and national self-interest.
But Mr. Trump had already drawn criticism from his Democratic rivals, and even within his own party, for presiding over a chaotic pullback from Syria, and the eruption of large-scale violence in Iran and Iraq could profoundly complicate his aim to seek a second term on a message of peace and prosperity. After Thursday’s attack, the Trump administration announced that thousands more troops would deploy to the region in anticipation of Iranian action.
At Democratic campaign events on Friday, there was already a strong ripple of anxiety running through the primary electorate, as voters who turned out to see several candidates voiced alarm as they imagined what Mr. Trump might do next.
“Nobody wants war, and that’s what I am afraid of, is that there is going to be war,” said Brenda Bachman, a 63-year-old from Marengo, Iowa, who had come to see Mr. Sanders. “We don’t need war.”
Ross Mercer, 37, a disabled Navy veteran in New Hampshire who served two tours in Iraq, said at Mr. Buttigieg’s event that he was worried about Iranian retaliation.
“We attacked their country first and I’m scared that they’re going to come back and attack our country,” Mr. Mercer said.
There is some precedent for events overseas reshaping American primary elections, often to the benefit of a candidate regarded as a figure of experience — in this case, perhaps Mr. Biden. In December 2003, the capture of Saddam Hussein in Iraq formed a backdrop for the final phase of a Democratic presidential primary that yielded the quick nomination of John F. Kerry, a Vietnam veteran who served on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Four years later, in 2007, the troop surge in Afghanistan and the December assassination of a former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, in Pakistan pushed national security to the center of an unsettled Republican primary that ended with the nomination of John S. McCain, the war hero whose campaign focused overwhelmingly on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“Our priority must be to avoid another costly war,” Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said.Credit...Elizabeth Frantz for The New York Times
Kevin Madden, a political strategist who advised Mr. Bush and Mitt Romney’s presidential campaigns, said national security tended to become an election issue in response to major external developments. He cited the Benghazi attack in the fall of 2012 and the Paris nightclub massacre in 2015 as other recent examples.
“Every recent contest has had one of these events,’’ Mr. Madden said, “where everything seems to stop and cause all the participants, from the candidates and campaigns to the voters and the media, to recalibrate the stakes of the election through the lens of national security and foreign policy.”
But an intensifying debate over foreign policy could have the effect of both spotlighting Mr. Biden’s extensive track record in the Middle East and subjecting it to new scrutiny. There have been signs in recent days that several of the leading Democratic candidates were angling for a foreign policy debate with Mr. Biden, even before the outbreak of violence in Iraq and the Suleimani killing came to consume the news.
Mr. Sanders has campaigned consistently on his antiwar record, and he has repeatedly highlighted Mr. Biden’s past support for the Iraq war, warning Democrats that Mr. Trump would use that record against the former vice president in a general election. On Friday morning, an aide to Mr. Sanders posted images on Twitter showing the progressive lawmaker speaking out against war in Iraq in 1991, 1998, 2002 and 2014.
Mr. Biden told reporters in Iowa on Friday that he would not respond to Mr. Sanders’s criticism, calling it “ridiculous” and countering that Mr. Sanders had his own “baggage.” He did not specify what he meant by that.
Mr. Buttigieg, meanwhile, has attempted to counter questions about his own relative inexperience by pointing to Mr. Biden’s stances on Iraq, as an example of how experience was not always an asset in campaigning or governing.
“He supported the worst foreign policy decision made by the United States in my lifetime, which was the decision to invade Iraq,” Mr. Buttigieg said in an Iowa television interview.
“If we have learned nothing else from the Middle East in the last 20 years, it’s that taking out a bad guy is not a good idea unless you are ready for what’s coming next,” Pete Buttigieg said in North Conway, N.H.Credit...Tristan Spinski for The New York Times
Mr. Sanders’s speech on Friday also indicated how he might use foreign policy to separate himself from other senators who are running for president: He pointed out that he has voted against all of Mr. Trump’s military budgets, a distinction that Ms. Warren and Ms. Klobuchar cannot claim.
It is impossible to predict precisely how an extended debate over foreign affairs might alter the dynamics of the Democratic race. On Friday, some voters said they yearned for a candidate with Biden-like credentials, while others said they wanted one with a Sanders-like aversion to war.
“I don’t think it would have escalated to this point if he was the current president,” Craig Bruxvoort, a 62-year-old Iowa voter, said of Mr. Sanders.
At Mr. Biden’s event in Dubuque, Karen Sudmeier, a retired teacher, said she had begun the day considering several options — including Ms. Klobuchar and Mr. Buttigieg — but after hearing Mr. Biden speak about the Middle East she had decided to support him.
“Joe knew everything about it,” said Ms. Sudmeier, 72. “He had a plan. And the consequences he laid out of what could happen, I thought, were frightening.”
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