Obama camp cites Pentagon in scrapping troop visit
PARIS (AP) - July 25, 2008 The spokesman, Robert Gibbs, said the Air Force several days ago
cleared Obama's chartered campaign jet to land at Ramstein Air
Base. It was only Wednesday night, two days before the planned
visit, that Pentagon officials conveyed their views, he said, and
Obama decided not to go.
Gibbs said Obama had decided several weeks ago he wanted to
visit wounded troops in Germany. Asked whether either the senator
or aides had considered that the trip might be viewed as political,
he replied, "We had taken some of that into consideration but we
believed that it could be done in a way that would not create, it
would not be created or seen as a campaign stop."
But after hearing from the Pentagon, he said, "We decided,
Senator Obama decided having made that decision he was far more
willing to take the criticism from some political people or
political opponents in a political atmosphere than to put our
troops in the middle of our campaign back and forth."
Sen. John McCain's campaign spokesman Brian Rogers criticized
the decision, saying, "Barack Obama is wrong. It is never
'inappropriate' to visit our men and women in the military."
Gibbs brushed that aside, and said Obama would have faced
criticism if the trip had taken place.
The tempest occurred as Obama neared the end of an unprecedented
election-season trip to the Middle East and Europe financed by his
campaign.
Talking to reporters en route from Berlin to Paris, Gibbs
disclosed the campaign had been planning for weeks to fly from the
German capital to Ramstein so the senator could meet with wounded
members of the armed forces at a military hospital in Landstuhl.
He said that the senator was to have left most staff and likely
all traveling reporters behind at the airport while he went to the
hospital to avoid appearances of a campaign event.
At the Pentagon, spokesman Bryan Whitman said Obama was told he
could go to Landstuhl, but the visit would have to conform to
Defense Department guidelines that restrict political activity on
military installation. That meant campaign staff would have been
barred from accompanying him, he said.
At the same time, he said, "The Pentagon certainly did not tell
the senator he could not visit Landstuhl."
The campaign faced questions during the day about the episode,
following dissemination of two written statements on Thursday as
word spread of the canceled trip.
In the first, Gibbs made no mention of the Pentagon, saying only
that Obama "decided out of respect for these servicemen and women
that it would be inappropriate to make a stop to visit troops at a
U.S. military facility as part of a trip funded by the campaign."
A few hours later, the campaign issued a statement in the name
of retired Gen. Scott Gration, an adviser to the senator, that
mentioned the Pentagon's involvement.