Obama's foreign trip: Mission accomplished

By John Whitesides, Political Correspondent - Analysis

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrat Barack Obama looked and sounded like a natural in the role of potential U.S. president during a carefully scripted overseas trip this week, passing a big test in the battle for the White House.

The first-term senator from Illinois smoothly executed his debut on the world stage, frustrating Republican rival John McCain and disappointing critics waiting for a telling mistake that would highlight his inexperience.

For Obama, who concludes the 7-country trip on Saturday, it was a chance to dispel doubts about his foreign policy expertise and display his credibility as a possible commander in chief.

"Obama passed the test, which was to show he can handle himself with foreign leaders and avoid a major gaffe," said Steven Schier, a political scientist at Carleton College in Minnesota.

"It doesn't transform the race and it doesn't win him the presidency -- but failure could have cost him the presidency. Now he can move on," he said.

Polls show Obama's lack of experience in world affairs remains one of his biggest hurdles with voters in November's election battle against McCain, a four-term Arizona senator and former Vietnam prisoner of war.

To dispel those concerns, Obama met with foreign leaders, carefully navigated the minefield of Israeli-Palestinian relations, visited U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, and drew a crowd of 200,000 to his speech in Berlin, Germany -- more than double the size of his biggest U.S. audience.

The trip, conducted with all the pomp of a presidential visit, produced a stream of warm images for voters back home. Obama, 46, held his first news conference on a Jordan hilltop with a sprawling view of the capital Amman behind him.