Story Highlights • Presidential candidate says small force should remain past 2009

• New York senator says troops would fight terrorists, train Iraqis

• Scenario works only if Iraqis "get their act together," she says

• Sen. Barack Obama laid out similar plan on Wednesday



Adjust font size:

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- If elected president, Sen. Hillary Clinton said, she would likely keep some U.S. forces in Iraq in a supporting role after 2009 because America has "a remaining military as well as a political mission" that requires a presence there.

However, in an interview with The New York Times published Thursday, Clinton said the American troops would not play a role in trying to curb sectarian violence.

Rather, they would be positioned north of Baghdad to combat terrorists, support the Kurds, counter any Iranian moves into Iraq and provide logistical, air and training support to the Iraqi government "if the Iraqis ever get their act together."

"If there is not any political resolution, the civil war will continue and we need to get out of the way," she told the Times. (Watch how Americans think the war is going )

Clinton aides say her comments are consistent with a broader plan by Democrats in Congress to begin redeploying combat troops, with the goal of having U.S. forces out of Iraq by March 2008. However, some political analysts say her support for a continued presence in Iraq could touch a raw nerve with anti-war Democrats.

"They're really not sure that she's with them on Iraq and other issues," said Larry Sabato of the University of Virginia's Center for Politics. "So they're suspicious, and that suspicion shows itself in what they say about her."

In 2002, Clinton voted for a congressional resolution authorizing President Bush to take military action in Iraq. And although she's become a vocal critic of the way the war has been executed, she has repeatedly refused demands from anti-war Democrats to admit her vote was a mistake, although she has said "knowing what I know now, I would not have voted for it."

Of her two closest rivals for the Democratic nomination, former Sen. John Edwards, has said his vote in favor of the 2002 resolution was a mistake; Sen. Barack Obama was still a state legislator in Illinois at the time of that vote, but he has opposed the war from the beginning.

Wednesday, Obama outlined a plan for maintaining a U.S. presence in Iraq similar to Clinton's.

"Withdrawal would be gradual, and we'd keep some U.S. troops in the region to prevent a wide war, to go after al Qaeda and other terrorists," he said.

The question is whether, given her previous record on Iraq, Clinton's call for continuing a U.S. presence might resonate differently with anti-war activists.

"They are not inclined to cut her much slack," Sabato said. "They are inclined to cut Barack Obama quite a bit of slack and John Edwards some slack as well."