Tuesday, August 14, 2007

U.S. troops in Afghanistan are "just air-raiding villages and killing civilians."

WASHINGTON (Map, News) - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama came under fire Tuesday for saying that U.S. troops in Afghanistan are "just air-raiding villages and killing civilians." The junior senator from Illinois made the comment Monday at a campaign stop in Nashua, New Hampshire.

"We've got to get the job done there," he said of Afghanistan. "And that requires us to have enough troops so that we're not just air-raiding villages and killing civilians, which is causing enormous pressure over there."

The comment drew a rebuke Tuesday from the campaign of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

"That is a very troubling remark on so many levels," said Romney spokesman Kevin Madden. "Most importantly, it's emblematic of Senator Obama's lack of experience for the job of commander-in-chief. But it's also an entirely inaccurate condemnation of the efforts of the men and women of the United States military who are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan."

A spokesman for Obama, who will speak at the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention in Missouri next week, did not immediately respond to Madden's criticism.

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