Kerry Spot    [ jim geraghty reporting ]
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AP:

Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry said Friday he would be willing to launch a pre-emptive strike against terrorists if he had adequate intelligence of a threat.

"Am I prepared as president to go get them before they get us if we locate them and have the sufficient intelligence? You bet I am," he said at a news conference at his Washington headquarters.

The Boston Globe, February 28: “Sen. John Kerry said President Bush's policy of “unilateral preemption” had failed to win the war on terror and only fueled anti-American anger worldwide.”

Kerry’s speech before the Council on Foreign Relations last December: “We have a President who has developed and exalted a strategy of war – unilateral; pre-emptive; and in my view, profoundly threatening to America’s place in the world and the safety and prosperity of our own society.”

Kerry on “Meet the Press” last December: “I did not buy into preemption … I thought that was wrong.” The doctrine of preemption the “most arrogant, inept, reckless and ideological foreign policy” in modern history.

[Posted 07/16 05:24 PM]