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Hillary vows to end Iraq war
02/02/2007 21:41 - (SA)
Washington - Senator Hillary Clinton vowed on Friday to end the Iraq war if she is elected president in 2008 and the war is still raging when she moves into the White House.
Clinton, criticised by core Democrats for her vote in the senate to authorise the war, is facing intense pressure about her stance on the conflict as she heads onto the presidential campaign trail.
"I want to be very clear about this: If I had been president in October 2002, I would not have started this war," she said at the Democratic National Committee's winter meeting, the first chance for the party's candidates to trade direct political blows.
"If we in congress don't end this war before January 2009, as president, I will," said the New York senator and former first lady.
Anger over war runs deep
Unlike one of her main rivals, former senator and vice-presidential candidate John Edwards, Clinton has stopped short of calling her vote for the war a mistake, saying President George W Bush misused her support and botched the war.
But while her position may help her in the centre ground key to winning US general elections, it does not endear her to core activists who will decide the Democratic nomination - where anger about the Iraqi war runs deep.
A slither of dissent in the party was evident, as several activists in a vast ballroom holding thousands of Democrats appeared to heckle the Iraq portions of the senator's speech.
Clinton has her own plan for Iraq, which would cap troop levels in the war-torn nation, and has threatened to work to cut off funding for the Iraqi army, unless Iraqi leaders take responsibility for quelling violence.
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