Former Pentagon official Michèle Flournoy is said to be on the short list to replace Chuck Hagel. Hagel is being forced out of the Obama administration, the first cabinet-rank change since voters roundly rejected Obama’s policies in the Nov. 4 elections.
Flournoy bears the distinction of having publicly defended Obama’s withdrawal of American troops from Iraq. During the 2012 election, Flournoy attacked Mitt Romney over the issue.
Romney, in comments that have turned out to be prescient in light of the rise of ISIS, ripped Obama’s troop withdrawal as “tragic.” That withdrawal left a vacuum of power into which the Islamic State has risen and seized territory the size of England.
“Governor Romney called the ending of the Iraq War and the bringing of our troops home ‘tragic,’ which is really hard to understand,” Flournoy said in an Obama campaign video. “He wanted to keep our troops there longer, tens of thousands of them.”
Such loyalty to Obama may be rewarded with an appointment to lead the Pentagon.
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