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Few Americans see Obama as strong military leader
[Arab News] Only 17 percent of Americans see President Barack B.O. Obama as a strong and decisive military leader, according to a Rooters/Ipsos poll taken after the United States and its allies began bombing Libya.
Perhaps they'll change their minds after it's gone on six months.
Nearly half of those polled view Obama as a cautious and consultative commander-in-chief and more than a third see him as indecisive in military matters.

Obama was widely criticized in 2009 for his months-long consultations with senior aides and military chiefs on whether to send more troops to Afghanistan.

Critics called it dithering, but he said such a big decision required careful deliberation. He eventually dispatched 30,000 more troops.

But Obama is facing mounting discontent among opposition Republicans and from within his own Democratic Party over the fuzzy aims of the US -led mission in Libya and the lack of a clearly spelled-out exit strategy for US forces.

If the Libya mission becomes a foreign policy mess, mixed with perceptions Obama is a weak military leader, it could spell trouble for him in the 2012 presidential election.

The poll also found that 60 percent of Americans support the United States and its allies bombing Libya to impose a no-fly zone to protect civilians from Libyan leader Muammar Qadaffy
... a proud Arab institution for 42 years ...
's forces.

Seventy-nine percent of those surveyed said the United States and its allies should try to remove Qadaffy, who has ruled the oil-exporting North African country for more than four decades.

Posted by: Fred 2011-03-26
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=319056