Ex-military leaders bash candidates before debate

[November 22, 2011]  WASHINGTON (AP) -- Three former top military officials slammed the Republican presidential field ahead of Tuesday night's GOP debate on foreign policy. The Democratic-leaning former officials said the entire Republican field has been all over the map but focused on GOP front-runner Mitt Romney.

"My concern would be that he might not be credibly decisive," Richard Danzig, who served as Navy secretary under President Bill Clinton, said of Romney on Monday. "There's too much of a track record here of moving between positions."

Danzig said President Barack Obama has shown the required decisiveness throughout his presidency.

Danzig, retired Gen. Wesley Clark and retired Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton critiqued the Republican field at a news conference organized by the Democratic National Committee.

Without naming Romney, Clark swiped at the former Massachusetts governor for comments downplaying the importance of capturing or killing Osama Bin Laden.

"One candidate said of Osama bin Laden, 'It's not worth moving heaven and earth and spending billions of dollars just trying to catch one person,'" Clark said, referring to Romney. "But like all of us, he cheered his demise."

Andrea Saul, a Romney spokeswoman, responded by assailing Obama's foreign policy but did not directly respond to the officials' criticism of Romney.

"President Obama's feckless foreign policy has emboldened our adversaries, weakened our allies, and threatens to break faith with our military," she said.

[Associated Press; By HENRY C. JACKSON]

Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.