"The absence seems all the more glaring, given that four years ago Mitt Romney made fighting "this century's nightmare, jihadism - violent, radical Islamic fundamentalism" a centerpiece of his campaign. On the other hand, this time around Team Romney concluded that on the subject of Afghanistan, the less said the better. And with good reason.
For starters, Romney despite his subsequent denials opposed the kind of unilateral U.S. raids that would eventually kill Osama Bin Laden. On August 1, 2007, then Senator Barack Obama delivered a major speech on foreign policy. In addition to pledging to unilaterally launch strikes against Bin Laden and other high-value targets in Pakistan, Obama promised he would ramp up the U.S. effort in the under-resourced effort across the border in Afghanistan. In July 2008, Obama explained that "we must make it clear that if Pakistan cannot or will not act, we will take out high-level terrorist targets like bin Laden if we have them in our sights." But the first version of presidential candidate Mitt Romney said no"
