Former vice president Dick Cheney reiterated Sunday that President Obama is responsible for turmoil in the Mideast, which he suggested would be more stable had America retained a military presence there.
“There was always an intention to leave behind forces” in Iraq, the former vice president said. “Once the combat operations were over there would be an agreement, another [status of forces] agreement negotiated to allow forces to stay behind.”
“That is what the Obama administration refused to do,” Cheney said. “The other thing that is indisputable is that when Barack Obama took the oath of office on January 20th 2009, the situation in Iraq — because of the surge ordered under the Bush administration — was stable.”
Cheney made the comments on “Fox News Sunday” during an appearance with his daughter, Liz.
The instability in Iraq fed into violence in Syria and around the Mideast, Cheney contended.
“I think when the U.S. played a major role in the region, when we were there on a significant basis, it would have been much easier to manage this kind of situation, today what you have is crisis of major proportions in Syria supported primarily by the Iranians,” he said. “I think what’s happened is, [Obama] created a huge vacuum, he’s made it very clear he’s not going to use military force to any effective extent.”
Cheney also declined to criticize presidential candidate Donald Trump, saying he was “not getting into the business of getting into a dust-up with any of our candidates.” He added that he was not prepared to endorse anyone, saying, “I’m not going to judge any of the candidates until we get further down the road.”
Cheney has repeatedly declined to comment on Trump over a series of interviews.
