Gates: Obama ISIS Strategy ‘Does Need To Be Sped up and Intensified’

‘So we have a near-term problem that needs to be addressed, or a near-term challenge from ISIS that needs to be addressed’

TODD: “The President's strategy. Should he speed it up? Speed up the implementation of the strategy? Or completely change it? Because there seems to be-- that seems to be among the debates. Well, the strategy, the right strategy, it just needs to be sped up.”
GATES: “Well, I think it does need to be sped up and intensified. I think that while ISIS is a long-term problem for us, we have near-term issues associated with it. All you have to do is look at the downing of the Russian airliner and the attack in Paris and the attacks in Beirut and so on. So we have a near-term problem that needs to be addressed, or a near-term challenge from ISIS that needs to be addressed. But then I hear people talk about a completely different strategy. I don't know what that is. You know, putting tens of thousands of U.S. troops in there is not a near-term solution. It would take months and months, even if you decided you wanted to do it, to put the logistics in place, get the troops trained, and so on. And then I'm not sure they don't aggravate the problem. You're not going to have combat formations coming out of Raqqa wearing ISIS uniforms to confront American troops. They're going to melt into a population of several hundred thousand people or more broadly. So I don't see what a totally different kind of strategy, what kind of totally different strategy, would actually work in those circumstances.”

 

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