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Obama begins Mideast, Europe trip in Afghanistan

THE WASHINGTON POST

July 20, 2008

KABUL, Afghanistan - Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama got his first look at deteriorating conditions in war-torn Afghanistan yesterday, meeting U.S. military commanders and local officials and touring part of the country by helicopter on the first day of a highly anticipated visit to the Middle East and Europe that drew a fresh rebuke from Republican rival John McCain.

Traveling as part of an official congressional delegation, the senator landed in the Afghan capital under tight security amid a surge of Taliban activity in recent weeks.

After a briefing at Bagram Air Base, he flew by helicopter to the northeastern city of Jalalabad in Nangarhar province, where he met U.S. soldiers and local leaders. From there, according to a U.S.-based aide, Obama set out by helicopter for a look at parts of eastern Afghanistan before returning to Kabul for a dinner with senior Afghan officials.

The presumptive Democratic nominee shied away from public comments as his trip began, belying intense interest in the trip and its political ramifications. McCain used his new weekly radio address yesterday to attack Obama's foreign policy credentials and judgment.

But as McCain sparred with his rival, the Illinois senator got an unexpected boost from Iraqi President Nouri al-Maliki, who told German magazine Der Spiegel that he looked favorably on Obama's call for a 16-month timetable for withdrawing most U.S. forces from Iraq.

The interview was printed a day after White House officials announced President George W. Bush and the Iraqi leader had reached agreement on the need to set a "time horizon" for withdrawing U.S. troops, a significant shift in position by a president who long had resisted applying any semblance of a timeline on U.S. military involvement.

HIS TRAVELS

Obama's plane touched down at Bagram Air Base, outside Kabul, Afghanistan, at 3:15 a.m. New York time (11:45 a.m. Kabul time) yesterday.

Later he traveled to Jalalabad Air Base in the country's frontier northeast, close to the border with Pakistan before returning to overnight at Bagram.

Today he is due to meet Afghan President Hamid Karzai, whose government he has recently accused of spending too much time in a bunker and not doing enough on development.

Details are deliberately sketchy due to security concerns, but reports indicate he is expected to fly to Iraq this afternoon where he's scheduled to meet Iraqi leader Nouri al-Maliki.

Also on the Mideast leg of his weeklong itinerary are stops in Jordan and Israel.

He is expected to meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin on Thursday, before going to France for a meeting with President Nicolas Sarkozy on Friday.

He will also stop in London for a meeting with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown - himself in Iraq and then Israel yesterday.

WHO PAYS? Accompanied in Afghanistan and Iraq by Sens. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) and Jack Reed (D-R.I.), this part is billed as a congressional delegation, paid for by taxpayers. The later Middle East and European legs of the trip are campaign-funded.