HILL REDRAWING HER BATTLE LINE By IAN BISHOP Post Correspondent
WASHINGTON - After recently vowing to quickly end the Iraq war if she becomes president, Hillary Rodham Clinton is now stressing a plan to keep some U.S. forces there indefinitely - a shift that analysts say shows she's feeling heat from both Barack Obama and Rudy Giuliani. Sen. Clinton's new tough stance is an attempt to convince voters she has the gravitas to be the first female commander in chief, political pros say.
In a surprising move, Clinton has begun emphasizing her plan to keep U.S. troops, mostly special forces, in Iraq to hunt down al Qaeda remnants in Anbar province and protect Israel and other countries in the region from Iran after pulling the bulk of U.S. combat forces out of Baghdad.
Political strategists say Clinton's harder-line posture - and acknowledgment that Iraq is vital in winning the broader war on terror and America's security - is a two-pronged approach. She aims to prove to primary voters that she has the seriousness and intellectual depth to overshadow less experienced rivals Obama and John Edwards, as well as the toughness to match up with GOP front- runner Giuliani.
Some of her claims mirrored those of the Bush administration. She told The New York Times, for instance, that a failed Iraqi state could serve "as a petri dish for insurgents and al Qaeda" and spiral into a wider conflict.
Clinton's insistence that the way forward in Iraq is "complex. It is dangerous. It is difficult," is a subtle but unmistakable shot at the more simplistic, easy-answer pullout plans offered by Obama and Edwards, strategists say.
"She's trying to make Obama and Edwards look childish, like they're not aware of the consequences," said one Democratic presidential- campaign veteran who is not aligned with a current contender. "It's her way of showing resolve and trying to show that she is the adult in the field."
Experts also say Clinton is further positioning herself to convince voters she can go toe-to-toe with Giuliani when it comes to determination in tracking down terrorists and protecting the United States.
"She can't win the general election unless she can demonstrate she can be commander in chief . . . If she advocates complete withdrawal, she wins the primary but loses the general," pollster John McLaughlin said.
"She's saying: 'I can be commander in chief. I can keep America safe by keeping people in Iraq.' She's willing to lose some of her primary lead to maintain a dead- even heat with Republicans in national polling."
Clinton's surprising vow to keep U.S. forces in Iraq even after she's president is the latest twist in her carefully re-choreographed stance on the war.
"I don't know how many [U.S. troops] we're talking about [keeping in Iraq], but . . . if we're getting good cooperation in al Anbar province and we've got al Qaeda pinned down, we can't walk away from that," Clinton said yesterday.
"When I'm president in January 2009, I'm going to have to start ending the war. And that will mean moving our troops out in a safe and orderly way with these remaining missions," she told The Post.
She added that America would not "need a lot of troops to keep that up. We're talking mostly special forces. We've got to have some openness to understanding what we need to do to protect ourselves."
Clinton's statement now that she will "start" ending the war is a marked shift from her promise last month to Democratic National Committee members that "if we in Congress don't end this war before January 2009, as president, I will."
Strategists say her move also is an attempt to gain wiggle room if she wins the White House.
"It's aimed at not boxing her in if she wins," another Democratic operative said. "She's finagling the bagel, which her husband did amazingly well, and for which she, as a senator, gets skewered."