Romney has no pullout plan: Obama campaign

Questioning the foreign policy credentials of Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential candidate, the Obama campaign has alleged former Massachusetts governor has no plan to withdraw troops from Afghanistan.

“In his recent convention speech, he was the first Republican presidential candidate in 60 years not to mention an ongoing war, the war in Afghanistan,” a presidential advisor told foreign journalists on the sidelines of the Democratic National Convention.

Michele Flournoy, the architect of the Obama administration’s Af-Pak policy, served as undersecretary of defense for policy for two years.

Romney spoke for nearly 45 minutes without mentioning Afghanistan, even though the US had tens of thousands of troops in harm’s way at this moment, she said.

“Governor Romney said ending the war in Iraq and bringing our troops home was tragic, and yet he has failed to outline any plan for how he would bring the war in Afghanistan to an end and bring our troops home,” Flournoy said.

On the other hand, she said, Obama had strong foreign policy credentials.“We have been a country at war for the past 10 years. Afghanistan, as you know, is the longest war in America’s history.

“The American people sense that it is time to end this decade of war, and there’s only really one candidate in this race who has a record of ending the war in Iraq responsibly and who has a plan to end the war in Afghanistan, and that’s President Obama,” she remarked.

As a candidate, President Obama was clear that he would end the war in Iraq responsibly, and he kept his promise, she said. In Afghanistan, the president had developed a plan – and NATO has endorsed it – to end the war there by 2014, Flournoy concluded.