Obama, Landstuhl, and a Manufactured "Controversy"

If you've been watching or reading the news at all this weekend, I'm sure you heard by now that the Obama campaign canceled a visit with wounded American soldiers at the Landstuhl and Ramstein U.S. military bases in Germany, and that the McCain campaign is blasting him for it.

If you were watching This Week with George Stephanopoulos this morning, then you heard John McCain say during an interview, "If I had been told by the Pentagon that I couldn’t visit those troops, and I was there and wanted to be there, I guarantee you, there would have been a seismic event." Later, during the same episode's roundtable discussion, Stephanopoulos brought up the cancellation for discussion by saying, "What I wonder is, how much did this misstep in Landstuhl hurt him?"

And of course, if you've been watching TV much at all, you may well have seen this McCain campaign ad claiming that Barack Obama canceled his visit with wounded troops in Germany because "the Pentagon wouldn't allow him to bring cameras."

But the McCain ad's assertion that Obama planned to bring press for the event is patently false, according to the Obama campaign. What were Obama's real reasons for cancelling this visit, which had been planned for weeks?

Obama had already stopped to visit with the troops a number of times on his trip through the Middle East and Europe, stopping for a game of basketball with troops in Kuwait, having breakfast with troops in Kabul, meeting with a crowd of 3,000 at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad. The Obama campaign had notified the Pentagon three weeks in advance that Obama planned to visit with wounded troops at Landstuhl and Ramstein. Yet, the Pentagon notified the Obama campaign just 48 hours before the planned visit that the visit might be considered an inappropriate political stop.

Obama has frequently visited with wounded troops in the past at sites like Walter Reed, and has shown an appropriate sensitivity to Pentagon rules and preferences regarding visits to wounded troops by political candidates. During these visits, he has never allowed the press to accompany him inside a hospital, and his campaign has staff has been noted for taking pains to make sure those visits were private by leaving them off of the Senator's official campaign schedule. In the case of the planned visits in Germany, just as in previous visits with wounded troops, the Obama campaign claims it had no intention to bring the press corps along for a photo op.

The key sticking point here seems not to have been, as Senator McCain's ad falsely implies, that the Obama campaign wanted to bring members of the press along on the visit. Pentagon spokesperson Elizabeth Hibner told Talking Points Memo: "We have longstanding Department of Defense policy in regards to political campaigns and elections. We informed the Obama staff that he was more than welcome to visit as Senator Obama, with Senate staff. However, he could not conduct the visit with campaign staff."

And the Pentagon apparently decided to adopt a very strict definition in this case of just who qualified as Obama campaign staff. According to Reuters, the Pentagon specifically told Obama that they were concerned about his plan to bring along retired Major General Scott Gration, who has endorsed Obama and is considered a campaign advisor, but is not paid for his advice by the campaign.

In a recent press conference, Obama said:    

"That triggered then a concern that maybe our visit was going to be perceived as political. And the last thing that I want to do is have injured soldiers and the staff at these institutions having to sort through whether this is political or not and get caught in the cross-fire between campaigns."

Not having been informed earlier that key members of his group would not be allowed to attend the troop visits in Germany, Obama had left his Senate staff behind in Jordan.

Incidentally, McCain himself has run into similar trouble scheduling troop visits as a political candidate. Stops at various military institutions on John McCain's "Service to America" tour in April 2008 reportedly triggered internal Navy and Pentagon discussions about when an event crosses the line between an appropriate visit with the troops as a Senator and an inappropriate, politically-themed campaign stop as a candidate for the Presidency. McCain was kept from speaking at some planned venues on that tour due to Department of Defense restrictions: for example, the Navy denied a McCain campaign request to speak at the Naval Aviation Museum at the naval base in Pensacola, Florida.

And more recently, Cindy McCain was denied access to the U.S. military hospital ship, the U.S.N.S. Comfort, because Pentagon officials decided it would qualify as a political visit.

I haven't seen the Obama campaign, or members of the press, accusing Cindy McCain of disrespecting the troops over that incident.

And though I do in fact recall a seismic event in April, I seriously doubt it had anything to do with the Pentagon denying John McCain unfettered access to the troops.

Here's what Republican Senator Chuck Hagel, who accompanied Obama on his international tour, said on CBS's Face the Nation in response to a question about the McCain campaign ad: "But I think it would be totally inappropriate for [Obama] on a campaign trip to go to a military hospital and use those soldiers as props. So I think he probably, based on what I know, he did the right thing. We saw troops everywhere we went on the congressional delegation. We went out of our way to see those troops. We wanted to see those troops. And that’s part of our job to see those troops, by the way, and listen to those troops, Bob. And we did."

When asked on the same program if he thought the McCain campaign ad was appropriate, Hagel responded, "I do not think it was appropriate."

I wholeheartedly agree with Hagel's last sentiment.

Some in the blogosphere, and in the mainstream media, are speculating that there may be a story behind this story.

After all, the McCain campaign seemed awfully ready in their response to this "controversy;" the campaign communication staff sent out a flurry of emails denouncing Obama's failure to visit Ramstein and Landstuhl almost immediately after the cancellation was announced on Thursday afternoon, and the aforementioned television ad attacking Obama for failing to visit the troops aired on Saturday.

I am not aware of any actual evidence that the McCain campaign was involved in the Pentagon's decisions in this matter. But if McCain backers at the Pentagon really were behind the last-minute notification to the Obama campaign that a trip the Pentagon had been aware of for weeks in advance had been deemed inappropriate, I doubt any proof will be forthcoming. It is, after all, the Pentagon's job to keep secrets.

Photo of Obama speaking in Berlin by Matthias W.

Jaelithe also writes at The State of Discontent.

Comments

[Sharon]

I saw Chuck Hagel's interview on CBS this morning and was pleasantly surprised by his candor and support of Obama. I wondered if something else was going on, besides McCain losing ground as Obama gains credibility.

[Donna]

Jaelithe, once again you have taken an issue and put it in perspective. Thank you for the work and research you did on this post.

[Granger]

Obama certainly was allowed to visit as a Senator w/ congressional staff. He was not allowed to visit the hospital with campaign staff and/or media. This was canceled by Obama, not the Pentagon. The rules were no mystery to anyone.

Obama is an opportunistic media whore and not qualified for CinC. That he is even the Democratic nominee is sickening and speaks volumes about the leadership bankruptcy within the Democratic Party.

[jaelithe]

Granger, why did the Pentagon initially approve Obama's travel plans if they had a problem with his bringing the retired Major General along? It was the Pentagon's decision to say at the last minute that Gration's position as an unpaid, unofficial campaign adviser trumped his status as a retired officer. As far as I know, ordinarily, retired military of Gration's rank are allowed to visit with wounded troops. Just as Obama had status to visit with the troops as a Senator, so did Gration have status to visit with the troops as a retired military commander.

As I stated, the Obama campaign NEVER PLANNED to bring the press along on his visit with wounded troops in Germany. That was never an issue.

If Obama is such a "media whore," why did he NOT PLAN to bring the press along on this visit? Why did he visit the troops at several stops along the way while he was abroad, including in many areas where the press corps was not allowed? Why does he regularly visit with wounded troops at Walter Reed, with no press, if he is only concerned about media appearances?

Obama literally met with THOUSANDS of our nation's young men and women serving overseas while he was on this very short trip.

It's the McCain campaign that has seized upon this one canceled event. It's the McCain campaign, and a sensationalist media, using what was essentially a bureaucratic scheduling snafu to play politics with our men and women in uniform.

Obama voted to support Jim Webb's GI Bill. McCain opposed it. Obama supports bringing our troops home from an unnecessary war. McCain has said he'd be fine with keeping them there for the next 100 years. Who really cares about our troops?