Democratic Platform Gives Obama Credit For Ending "Global War On Terrorism"

Consigning a controversial phrase to history.

NORFOLK, VA - SEPTEMBER 04: U.S. President Barack Obama speaks during a campaign rally at Norfolk State University on September 4, 2012 in Norfolk, Virginia. On Thursday President Obama will officially accept his presidential nomination at the 46th Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. Image by Mark Wilson / Getty Images

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The Democratic platform gives President Barack Obama credit for rebranding what President George W. Bush& called the “global war on terrorism.”

In a section dealing with defeating al-Qaeda, the platform celebrates the killing of Osama Bin Laden, as well as Obama narrowing the focus of U.S. foreign policy away from fighting all terrorism, to targeting just the terrorist group responsible for 9/11 and its allies.

Importantly, President Obama also shifted away from the Bush administration’s sweeping and internationally-divisive rhetoric of a “global war on terrorism” to a more focused effort against an identifiable network of people: al-Qaeda and its affiliates. That has allowed us to target force with
greater precision against those who want to harm Americans and attack the United States and move away from the type of large-scale military deployments characteristic of the previous administration and favored by many Republicans today.

Ending the “GWOT” has been a longtime personal crusade of Vice President Joe Biden, and a longtime goal of many foreign policy hands who viewed it as too easy to interpret — or distort — as a war on Islam. President Obama has long avoided the phrase but has not particularly trumpeted the change, which is an easy target for his hawkish critics.