Tom Ridge: Obama ‘Disingenuous’ for Pretending U.S. Advisers ‘Not in Harm’s Way’

‘It’s fiction. They are in harm’s way. There are boots on the ground’

Tom Ridge: Obama ‘Disingenuous’ for Pretending U.S. Advisers in Iraq ‘Not in Harm’s Way’ (National Review Online)

Former Homeland Security secretary Tom Ridge rejected the White House’s characterization of its operation against the Islamic State as a painless air campaign, calling it ”disingenuous” to suggest that the approximately 1,600 U.S. special forces on their way to Iraqi battlefields ”are not in harm’s way.”

Ridge appeared on CNN Thursday to react to President Obama’s speech, which laid out a vague strategy to defeat Islamist fighters in Iraq and Syria. The first Homeland Security secretary felt compelled to push back against the president’s implication that an antiseptic air campaign — and no “boots on the ground” – will be enough to defeat the jihadists.

“It is disingenuous to say that the men and women that we’re going to send to Iraq are not in harm’s way,” he claimed. ”They’re not wearing sneakers. They’re probably going to help pre-position air strikes. They may be military advisers.” 

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