President Obama's address to the nation Wednesday night concerning ISIS explained to the American People what his administration plans to do. The details were lacking but we know ISIS will no longer have a safe place in Syria or Iraq. The President has also kept his promise of no U.S. ground combat troops fighting in Iraq and that the Iraqi military will have to stand up and defend their country with the help of air support from the United States.
The President adopted the right course of action when he and his military advisers took the time required to develop a workable plan to deal with ISIS and to bring our allies inside and outside of the middle east along. It is not how quick you act but the quality of your judgement and your actions.
Fighting ISIS and terror is not conventional warfare. Terrorists melt in and out as they choose to do. In the middle east they are part of secular groups as well as religious groups and have the support of both. The middle east is the oldest part of the world and is where civilization began over 5 thousand years ago in what is now southern Iraq. Warfare has yet to settle their differences 5 thousand years later.
Those negative voices who have been calling for American combat troops to return to Iraq for combat operations have yet to learn any thing. The President has the courage and wisdom to correct the mistakes of the past. How many people remember that the surge that Bush ordered was supposed to buy time so that Iraq could come up with a government that represented all factions? That never happened and we are witnessing the results today. A united Iraq by Iraqi's is the only way to save Iraq.
The President's strategy and policy for fighting Al Queda has been a success and I believe he will also have success in the quest against ISIS. I believe the President's decision should be supported and his judgement that it is the people in the middle east themselves who have the responsibility to make and keep their own country safe. The last three sentence of a commentary I wrote on 12/26/07 titled, "About Face In The Iraq War" was as follows: Iraq will look nothing like Bush saw in his dream. But lucky for Bush, he wont have to deal with the mess he created much longer. Unfortunately, the next President will bear the burden of his reckless behavior.
Of course we know the next President was and is Barrack Obama and the negative voices out there are still trying to justify the war in Iraq over WMD that did not exist. The country needs to support the President's decision.
This commentary written by John Lucia
