The Washington Post hit President Obama for remarks he delivered this week regarding critics of current White House policy toward the Islamic State, calling him petty and defensive.
“Pressed about his strategy for fighting the Islamic State, a petulant-sounding President Obama insisted Monday, as he has before, that his critics have offered no concrete alternatives for action in Syria and Iraq, other than putting ‘large numbers of U.S. troops on the ground,'” a Post editorial said Monday night.
During a press conference in Turkey, Obama indicated he would make little if any changes to the administration’s anti-terrorism policies abroad, even after last week’s attack in Paris that left more than a 100 people dead and many more injured.
“If folks want to pop off and have opinions about what they think they would do, present a specific plan,” Obama said of his critics. “If they think that somehow their advisers are better than the chairman of my joint chiefs of staff and the folks who are actually on the ground, I want to meet them. And we can have that debate.”
Many Republicans, Sens. John McCain and Lindsey Graham among them, have called on Obama to dispatch more ground troops in Syria and other areas in the Middle East to combat the Islamic State more aggressively. Obama has resisted, however, preferring targeted airstrikes on the Islamic State compounds and sending only low numbers of special forces to aid local allies in the fight.
The Post said that there are no available options that would entirely undo the Islamic State but that Obama “would be wise to set aside his defensiveness” and consider taking a more aggressive stance both militarily and diplomatically.
