Wednesday, September 3, 2014
The World Is Waiting for the Obama ISIS Strategy
An ISIS spokesman said recently that the group plans to raise "the flag of Allah" over the White House. ISIS has also said that they will meet America in New York City and "drown" Americans in blood. But on August 28, President Obama told America that "we don't have a strategy yet" for dealing with ISIS. And as of today Obama has not yet given any indication of having found a strategy. The President continues to react, rather than lead an offensive against ISIS. Obama orders airstrikes and sends a few hundred US military, mostly Special Forces units, to Baghdad and Irbil, but strategic action is lacking. Here are some of the major points made by American and other officials as the ISIS crisis continues and escalates. ~~~~~ Former CIA agent Bob Baer told CNN in mid-August that ISIS cells are already in the United States, and some of them have entered by crossing the Mexican border. Baer told CNN that people working in intelligence-gathering have told him they don't know what ISIS members' plans are, but "it's a definite concern." People who do this for a living are very alarmed," Baer said. Other ISIS members are American citizens who have been to Syria and have returned, he said, adding that while intelligence agencies are aware of some of the people they suspect of being ISIS members and are working to gather evidence to apprehend them, they fear there are more that they don't know about. This was brought home yesterday when we learned that the Department of Homeland Security has "lost" 9,000 people, many university students, whose visas have expired. ~~~~~ On August 21, ISIS released the video of the beheading of American journalist James Foley. Yesterday, ISIS released a video of the beheading of American journalist Steven Sotloff. ISIS had threatened to behead Sotloff at the end of the James Foley video if the United States did not cease airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq. Baer told CNN that he had expected the killings after US airstrikes helped hinder ISIS' efforts in Iraq. "They have no choice in their minds but to strike back," Baer said. Foley and Sotloff were among at least four Americans publicly known to be held by ISIS, and Baer said they essentially grabbed the first American they could in order to carry out the grisly actions that they then released on video. With ISIS continuing to be hurt by American attacks, Baer said he expects them to continue to behead Western captives. "I think there'll be more," he said. ~~~~~ In early September, just after the James Foley video appeared, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said that the President believes "military might is not the only tool in the tool box here," when asked whether Obama agreed with Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel's earlier statement that ISIS is "an imminent threat to every interest we have" and "beyond anything that we've seen." Earnest responded, "What is true is that there is a serious threat that's posed by" ISIS. And when asked whether there was "an imminent threat to America," he replied, "Well, it certainly is an imminent … [threat to] American interests." ~~~~~ Speaking at the same press conference as Defense Secretary Hagel, Army General Michael Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, characterized ISIS as an apocalyptic organization that cannot be merely halted, but must be defeated not only in Iraq but in Syria. Dempsey said : "Can they be defeated without addressing that part of their organization which resides in Syria? The answer is no. That will have to be addressed on both sides of what is essentially at this point a nonexistent border." ~~~~~ In an early September speech to ambassadors in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah warned the US and Europe that they will be attacked if there is not a strong international response to terrorism. "They could be in Europe in one month, America in two months," he said, urging the ambassadors to relay his message directly to their heads of state. ~~~~~ In August, retired General Michael Hayden, a former CIA Director, warned it is not prudent for the United States to withdraw from Afghanistan, as President Barack Obama has pledged to do before the end of his second term. "The President has promised this withdrawal by the time he leaves office....he's going to make Afghanistan look like Iraq. That's not a good plan," Hayden said. ~~~~~ Dear readers, there is a lopsided debate in the US between President Obama and the rest of America about whether ISIS does or does not yet have the capability to strike America, even as it threatens American interests and allies in the Middle East. The operative word here is “yet.” If there are ISIS cells in the US, it has a current ability to strike America. With this intelligence warning, President Obama ought to act now to degrade and destroy ISIS, before it builds up a greater capacity to attack American targets on American soil. The US non-reaction to James Foley's and Steven Sotloff’s beheadings could be seen as weakness and embolden ISIS. Against this, we should consider that ISIS may be overstretched with the territory it already controls. As the Wall Street Journal reported : Initially, many in the sunni-majority city of Mosul were pleased to see ISIS fighters send the mostly shiite Iraqi army fleeing after sectarian tensions in the country worsened under Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. But, “People aren’t sympathizing with them anymore. People wanted to get rid of the Iraqi army. But after [ISIS] turned against Mosul, the people of Mosul started turning against them.” The intelligence community estimates that ISIS has 10,000 to 17,000 fighters -- a rather large terrorist organization, but perhaps not large enough to continue to control cities and conquer more territory, especially if or when sunni militias begin to join the fight against ISIS. Of course, controlling territory requires a large group, but terrorist attacks in the US would require only a few ISIS returnees with a target and plan to hit it. American intelligence estimates that 300 ISIS fighters are American citizens, according to a Washington Times report. This is a real threat that Obama needs to pay attention to, along with following the British lead of closely controlling the mobility of US passport holders who have joined ISIS. In another area, America has not heard anything from Obama about any new effort to free American hostages held by ISIS and other jihadist groups. While British foreign secretary Phillip Hammond said the UK is looking "at every possible option to protect" the 44-year-old British citizen now threatened with beheading in the Sotloff video, today President Obama could only describe the video as "barbaric," adding that the US will not be intimidated by the radical Islamists and vowing to build a coalition to "degrade and destroy" ISIS. But, also today, Lord West, the former head of the British navy, described the ISIS executioner of Foley and Sotloff as "a dead man walking" and said US Special Forces will hunt him down in the same way they tracked and killed Osama Bin Laden. Evidently, either Lord West knows something we don't know, or, he joins all Americans in having great faith in the US military, with or without an Obama ISIS strategy to follow.
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No one has commented on the fact that Mr. Sotloff was a dual citizen of American an Israel. I am not sure if that means anything. It especially doesn't to Mr. Sotloff today.but There is a hintof some added hatred in his hideous murder.
ReplyDeleteHaving been one - you an run but you can not hide from US Special Forces Teams.
ISIS should remember that the pendulum swings both ways evenly in arc and force.
Locally, locally and internationally, we live under governments that prefer to rule rather than to serve, that choose not to tell us the truth but to keep it from us, and that have enacted laws that purport to make their behavior legal.
ReplyDeleteIn 1949, when George Orwell wrote “1984,” Orwell predicted all this, including the secret torture, the perpetual warfare, the continuous spying and the fear of the government. His predictions were right on the mark — only mistaken by 30 years. It is a path to an authoritarian America, predicted by the British writer in his dark and terrifying novel “1984,” in which governmental power was fortified by fear at home and war abroad.
At the root of the chaos in the Middle East and here at home are governments that respect no limits on their exercise of power. Public officials who are supposed to be our public servants — routinely lately behave they are our masters. They reject the limitations of the Constitution, they don’t believe that our rights are undeniable, and they fail to comprehend the dangerous path down which they are leading us
“William Bradford, speaking in 1630 of the founding of the Plymouth Bay Colony, said that all great and honorable actions are accompanied with great difficulties, and both must be enterprised and overcome with answerable courage… We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too… Many years ago the great British explorer George Mallory, who was to die on Mount Everest, was asked why did he want to climb it. He said, "Because it is there." ,,,Well, space is there, and we're going to climb it, and the moon and the planets are there, and new hopes for knowledge and peace are there. And, therefore, as we set sail we ask God's blessing on the most hazardous and dangerous and greatest adventure on which man has ever embark.”
ReplyDeleteThese friends are excerpts from a JFK speech given at Rice University Football Stadium. He rallied a nation to go to the Moon and beyond with this speech. He made America believe it could from ground up develop a complete new technology. HE DID IT WITH HIS WORDS AND PRESENTATION SKILLS. And Obama who is self-acclaimed to be a true follower of President Kennedy can’t even rally his own democratic party to the fact that he has no ISIS policy and as he says doesn’t need one.
Obama will come home from these NATO meeting with the ideas PM Cameron and other leaders there and call it his plan. But if it fails Obama will be first in line to lay plan for the ideas of the plan on others.
American Exceptionalism has died in these Obama years.
I hope that there will still be a shining city on a hill, because everything below the hill is and has been for the past nearly 6 years been plunging into darkness and barbarism. That is what is happening to the map on Obama's watch.
ReplyDeleteOkay, you don't have a strategy Obama because you don’t really care. He doesn't care. He doesn't want to be bothered by it. This is not why he became president. This is an interruption. It's interference. This is getting in the way of what he really wants to do, what his purpose is, which is the transformation of the country. But he's got to do this stuff because it's part of the job. But he really doesn't like it and he's not interested in it.
Can you imagine if that had been the United States president’s attitude about Hitler and the Nazis? Can you imagine if that had been the attitude about imperial Japan back in World War II? Can you imagine if that been the attitude about the Soviet Union and the Berlin Wall?
The world may be waiting for Obama to reach a decision on exactly what his Strategy Plan for defeating ISIS is! But more so I think the world is waiting for the departure of President Obama. There would be a sigh of relief from the 4 corners to wake to the news that Obama has resigned and on his way back to Chicago. Every time he maligns American, a small piece of every nation is lost.
DeleteAs the terrorists of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) threaten Baghdad, thousands of slaughtered Iraqis in their wake, it is worth recalling a few of President Obama's past statements about ISIS and al Qaeda. "If a J.V. team puts on Lakers' uniforms that doesn't make them Kobe Bryant" (January 2014). "[C]ore al Qaeda is on its heels, has been decimated" (August 2013). "So, let there be no doubt: The tide of war is receding" (September 2011).
ReplyDeleteThe president explained his view in his Sept. 23, 2009, speech before the United Nations General Assembly. "Any world order," he said, "that elevates one nation above others cannot long survive." Tragically, he is quickly proving the opposite—through one dangerous policy after another—that without American pre-eminence, there can be no world order.
American freedom will not be secured by empty threats, meaningless red lines, leading from behind, appeasing our enemies, abandoning our allies, or apologizing for our great nation—all hallmarks to date of the Obama doctrine. Our security, and the security of our friends around the world, can only be guaranteed with a fundamental reversal of the policies of the past six years.
In 1983, President Ronald Reagan said, "If history teaches anything, it teaches that simple-minded appeasement or wishful thinking about our adversaries is folly. It means the betrayal of our past, the squandering of our freedom." President Obama is on track to securing his legacy as the man who betrayed our past and squandered our freedom.
ISIL which stands for the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria or al-Sham, but both describe the same murderous organization. The difference is that the Levant describes a territory far greater than simply Iraq and Syria. It’s defined as this: The Levant today consists of the island of Cyprus, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, and part of southern Turkey.
ReplyDeleteSo why would Obama prefer ISIL? An “army” of that territorial magnitude takes the focus off the two countries that many believe define Obama’s continued failure in the Middle East. Most likely, he would rather eliminate the connection between the chaoses in Iraq with his inaction in Syria. Better that the upheaval in a country to which we committed so much blood and treasure remain the fault of George W. Bush. The president has already been tarred with having failed to secure a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) with Prime Minister al-Maliki, which would have allowed a contingent of American troops to stay in Iraq. Numerous sources have claimed that Obama purposefully undermined the negotiations over a SOFA, suggesting he wanted to score political points by getting our troops out, no matter the long-term consequences of an overly hasty exit.
President Obama was clever to announce that our military advisors would soon be helping Iraq confront the insurgent ISIL; Americans might not be so forgiving about sending more of our best and bravest to help push back ISIS. It’s all in the words as to what the message sends!
Any strategy to defeat ISIS will be very complex and will not take shape overnight But ISIS can be defeated, with patience and planning. The bases in Syria can be harassed from the air by the Americans and eventually destroyed on the ground by the Syrians. They can be stopped in Kurdistan, while being required to keep large forces idle on that front to prevent attacks from the Peshmerga. And Iraq in time MAY build up its own military sufficiently to go on the offensive. After all, a nation under such a threat as Iraq is has only two courses of study open to it: learn how to defend themselves or learn how to be slaves. In the meantime, trade routes have to be cut off, while sources of ISIS funds have to be found and stopped. Ironically, the ISIS army in Iraq may face the same problems that confronted the American Army, an alien force occupying an increasingly disaffected subject population.
ReplyDelete