Romney Still Supports Troop Surge

Mitt Romney appeared last night on The O'Reilly Factor with Bill O'Reilly. He has again made it clear that he supports the President's decision to send more troops to Iraq. But he is quite keen to bring the troops home as soon as it is possible, without jeopardising the region.

ROMNEY: Well, as long as there's a pathway to a successful resolution in Iraq, meaning a stable central government even with some sub states that are strong, that's a pathway we have to pursue. And the president and al-Maliki from Iraq have said that they believe that there is a course of being successful which would include providing security for the citizens of Iraq and allowing the country to rebuild itself.

And that that's going to require an extra 20,000 or 25,000 personnel. My view is that's something we ought to try as long as there's a pathway that looks like it's reasonably probable of being successful. If it's not working, and we'll know within a few months, then we can take a different course.

But simply turning around and walking away could lead to the kinds of terrible outcomes that could ultimately require even more troops coming in and more casualties. Our interest here is all the same. Get our boys and our women home as soon as we possibly can. But don't do it in such a way that we cause the kind of event that would require us to have to come back.

O'REILLY: All right. Now, so you are saying that a few more months and if we don't see improvement then we have to redeploy the troops?

ROMNEY: Well, at that point we'll look at what other plans are available. But right now the right course is to provide security to the Iraqi citizens.

Transcript of Romney's interview here.