PRESIDENTS Nixon and Johnson went to Vietnam. President Bush Sr went to Saudi Arabia in 1990 before the war to liberate Kuwait. But none was ever at any risk of hearing a shot fired in anger.

When President Bush flew into the world’s most dangerous airport yesterday to share a turkey supper with his troops, he pulled off one of the most daring stunts in modern American history. It was a powerful symbolic act aimed at boosting morale, silencing critics of his Iraq policy and halting his sliding approval rating. He set out to prove that the war-torn Iraqi capital — or at least its massively fortified airport — is not out of bounds for the world’s only superpower leader.

The audacity of the trip was stunning and totally at odds with Mr Bush’s previous foreign excursions.

On his state visit to Britain last week he rarely ventured beyond the confines of Buckingham Palace and was cocooned behind a security cordon of thousands of British policemen and US Secret Service agents.

In October his security detail prevented him spending more than a few hours in relatively friendly countries such as the Philippines and Indonesia.

Contrast that with the arrival last night of Air Force One at Baghdad International Airport, which is so dangerous that normal commercial flights are banned and most travellers to and from the capital refuse to go by air.

This month a US Army helicopter, approaching the airport, was shot down killing 16 soldiers.

In the past, US presidents have visited American forces in the field. But the secret flight to Baghdad was an altogether different undertaking. Not since the Second World War, when President Roosevelt visited the troops in Sicily, has an American leader embarked on such a risky trip.

Probably not since the American Civil War, when battles raged only a few miles from Washington, has the incumbent of the White House deliberately placed himself in such danger.

The US President, who is commander in chief of the armed forces, does have a responsibility to boost morale by proving to the men and women under his command that he is prepared to share the risks that they face in the field.

In Mr Bush’s case his visit to the troops may also have been motivated by political considerations — and critics will see the fingerprints of Karl Rove, the President’s image-maker, all over yesterday’s drama.

As he prepares for his looming presidential re-election campaign next year, Mr Bush badly needs to counter the daily reports of American casualties with some positive news. Yesterday criticism of his policy was silenced by images of his tearful address to hundreds of cheering soldiers, and his sagging poll ratings seem certain to jump in the wake of the PR coup.

Mr Bush and his aides may also have been anxious to dispel the damaging impression the President left after his last high-profile encounter with American forces.

In a carefully orchestrated visit to the USS Abraham Lincoln in May, Mr Bush was seen wearing a military flight suit and posing in front of a large banner, which declared: “Mission Accomplished.”

More American soldiers have been killed in Iraq since that declaration than in the three weeks it took to topple Saddam Hussein and remove his Baathist regime. Yesterday Mr Bush made no such rash claims. His tone was humble and he deliberately wore civilian clothes.

It may have been no coincidence that his surprise trip to Baghdad eclipsed coverage of another Thanksgiving dinner visit to US forces in the field.

This time the setting was Afghanistan, and the guest of honour was Senator Hillary Clinton, one of Mr Bush’s most ardent critics.

Times Recommends

• Rio Tinto four held as China prepares case
• Diplomats must keep heads down and trousers up
• When in Rome should one make like Berlusconi?