This evening in a prime-time address to the nation President Obama finally outlined his strategy to deal with the genocidal Islamic barbarian horde know as ISIS(I am not ever going to call them ISIL).
To be perfectly blunt this was a rather pathetic address to the nation, with a weak outlining of the threat ISIS poses to the United States and the rest of the civilized world, with an inadequate strategy to deal with the terrorist scum.
The jest of President Obama’s “counter terrorism” strategy to deal with ISIS is to continue to do more of the same, but with more international partners chipping in.
President Obama stated that the month long limited air strike campaign in northern Iraq will continue with one new caveat those air strike will now assist Iraq military forces as they attempt to reclaim their country from the barbarian horde.
President Obama also stated that he will authorize the US Air Force to begin launching air strikes against ISIS targets inside Syria.
While President Obama claimed that he has the authority, as commander-in-chief, to do this action on his own he welcomes Congress supporting him.
Additionally 475 more American soldiers will be sent to Iraq to help them with training and intelligence.
President Obama also continued his push to have the US provide arms and support to the Syrian rebels. This I most strongly disagree with. There isn’t a Syrian rebel faction worth giving anything to. Some of them have and are joining ISIS. Others are joining Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria the Al-Nusra Front. And of course there is that rebel group that captured American journalist Steven Sotloff and handed him over to ISIS for money; ISIS then proceeded to behead him and fellow American James Foley in the last few weeks.
I was incredulous when Obama said that “We must remain vigilant as threats emerge”. As we have learned in recent days President Obama has been given daily intelligence briefings about the threat posed by ISIS for over a year and still he was caught flat footed when they executed their blitzkrieg across much of Iraq earlier this summer; at the hight of the blitz ISIS was around 100 miles from overrunning Baghdad and there was nothing that was going to stop them if they tried. The US only got involved months later when ISIS was on the verge of committing a genocide of an Iraqi religious minority that had become trapped on a mountain.
In a statement that just outright annoyed me President Obama stated that “we have not yet detected specific plots against the homeland” from ISIS. That is simply not true. Just a few weeks ago a terror alert was issued for the entire southern border the fear being ISIS could launch car bomb attacks against US targets from Juarez, Mexico.
Then there are the internet messages ISIS terrorist have posted of them claiming to already be inside the United States.
One showed their operative in Chicago, another was taken from the gates of the White House.
In a minor positive sign President Obama hinted that he would be willing to support a bill by Sen. Ted Cruz and Rep. Michele Bachmann that would deny Americans who have traveled overseas to join ISIS or other terrorist groups from being able to return to the country with Obama saying that we have to stem the flow of foreign fighters into and out of Syria and Iraq.
President Obama repeatedly mentioned that no American ground troops or ground combat would take place.
A heavy emphasis was also placed on the fact that an international coalition would be taking part in this endeavour to “degrade and destroy” ISIS.
Personally I think President Obama should have spent a little bit more time talking about the facts like ISIS terrorist have made attempts to build their own weapons of mass destruction as evidenced by that captured laptop that contained plans to build a bio weapon, or that Americans have been killed fighting on behalf of ISIS in Syria, and completely drop the talk about domestic issues like a thriving auto industry and that we are closer than ever to being energy independent(which is no thanks to his policies or EPA).
This strategy of almost all air strikes and reliance on building up the Syrian rebels, who are no better than ISIS, is woe-fully inadequate and at least six months too late.
