Republican presidential candidate Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., blasted President Obama’s foreign policy, saying his approach has “backfired” and left the Middle East “more dangerous and unstable.”
Obama’s “disengagement” from the tumultuous Middle East, symbolized by his withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Iraq in 2011, has created a “vacuum” that’s “been filled by bad actors, including terrorist extremists,” Rubio wrote in a Washington Post op-ed Friday night.
“The Middle East is more dangerous and unstable than when Obama came into office — a time when Iraq and Syria were more stable, the Iranian nuclear program was considerably less advanced and the Islamic State did not yet exist,” Rubio wrote, a view unlikely to be controversial with the Republican base he needs to win to succeed in his bid for the Republican nomination.
“The fall of the Iraqi city of Ramadi to the Islamic State and recent gains by the group in Syria are the latest signs that President Obama’s strategy to defeat this brutal terrorist group is failing,” he wrote. “But the problem is far bigger than that. The president’s entire approach to the Middle East has backfired.”
Rubio offered four prescriptions to reassert leadership in the region: the U.S. should broaden the coalition, increase U.S. involvement in the fight, “not cut a bad deal with Iran,” and prevent the Islamic State’s expansion beyond Iraq and Syria.
Under the heading “broaden the coalition,” Rubio suggested a coalition of regional partners to fight the Islamic State, including the Kurds and Sunni tribes and then he named the countries Egypt, Jordan and Turkey, three countries which are already part of Obama’s coalition to “degrade and defeat ISIL.”
Rubio wrote that the U.S. should place more troops in Iraq, a view that is popular with the Republican base although unpopular with the broader American public. He also wants to increase airstrikes and special operations in Iraq.
Rubio wrote that “we need to act more quickly to prevent the emergence of other failed and failing states” like Libya that are “fertile territory for the Islamic State and other terrorist groups.” He dinged Obama’s “lead from behind” approach in Libya.
