I understand in this day and age that people want to know everything that's going on just as soon as it happens, but that is not only impractical in matters of diplomacy and warfare, it is often very unwise. There are a lot of negotiations going on, there are friendly governments who don't need to hear important matters on CNN before they hear from Obama or Kerry. Worse there are enemies that don't need to know our plans and capabilities. In addition we are in a situation where the scenario changes daily requiring changes in strategy. It's almost impossible to lay out a master plan that may have to be modified before the week is out. The media often feels some kind of entitlement to be informed of every detail to keep from having dead air on their 24-hour news feeds and a hear some of this in the article. But that is not the Presidents problem.
The guy does make some good points . . .
"The United States does not, in the 21st century, have the necessary power to combat the jihadis on its own; it must have partners and allies. The jihadis are a direct threat to Assad’s Syria, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf States, Jordan, and Western Europe, to name a few. Washington has to forge a military coalition to fight the jihadis in Iraq and Syria, and all of these states have to contribute to the effort in one way or another. Yes, Moscow and Tehran are troublesome today for a variety of good reasons. That said, they feel as or more threatened by the jihadis, and would be as or more willing than Washington to contribute to the jihadi defeat."
Our allies have been dragging their feet and expecting us to do it all as usual.
"Fashioning this military/diplomatic coalition has to take priority over resolving nasty internal political problems in Baghdad and Damascus. Mr. Obama and his team seem to want to solve the political problems before they do anything else in a serious way. That will take too long and will be too risky. It’s critical to resolve all these problems, but it’s more critical to stop the jihadis now and drive them back. In the meantime, let Iraqi forces and various Syrians help where they can on the battlefield."
Here he is missing something important. We are already helping the Syrian resistance and the Iraqis (mostly the deserving Kurds, but there are hundreds of advisors in Baghdad). But we cannot go to war to protect the Malaki regime, whose incompetence brought about the current situation. We had managed to get many of the Sunni tribal chiefs to cooperate before we left, but Malaki shut them out of the government and the army and many have gone over to the Islamic State. It is important to get Maliki out of the way right now. Pouring money and weapons to people who steal the money and squander the equipment makes no sense whatsoever.
