Cruz: ‘We Should Do Whatever Is Needed to Destroy ISIS’

BLITZER: “On the issue of destroying ISIS, you heard Donald Trump say he’s open to sending 20,000 troops to kill ISIS. Are you ready to send 20,000 troops in there to try to destroy ISIS?”
CRUZ: “Wolf, we should do whatever is needed to destroy ISIS, but as  mentioned, there are a lot of tools we haven’t used yet. We haven’t used overwhelming air power, we haven’t been arming the Kurds. And typically when you are engaging you are using the tools that you have and boots on the ground are the last steps but that needs to be driven by the military expertise, not by politicians either trying to act tough or not.”
BLITZER: “If the military says to you as the commander-in-chief, 20,000 troops, send them to Raqqa, you send them to Mosul. You have got to go there on the ground and air power alone won’t do it, will you send those troops in?”
CRUZ: “Absolutely yes, but here are the principles we should follow. If we need to use military force, and with ISIS we do, we should use overwhelming force, we should kill the enemy and we should get the heck out. We shouldn’t be staying there for decades and trying to turn Iraq and Syria into Switzerland.”