Asked for his assessment of the anti-ISIS campaign, which has lasted more than a year, Obama said the group is no longer growing stronger but that more needs to be done to “completely decapitate” their ability to carry out large-scale operations. They have not gained ground in Iraq. “We should consider them, whether we would ultimately adopt them or not”.
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Candidates ranging from Democratic former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to Republican neurosurgeon Ben Carson have called for the U.S.to establish a no-fly zone in Syria to try to stem the bloodshed and give U.S.-supported forces a chance to succeed in the fight against ISIS in the region. At the time 54 percent said they would oppose sending in troops while 40 percent said they favor it. “And in Syria – they’ll come in, they’ll leave”.
“A majority of Americans continue to describe the Iraq War as a mistake”, they added, referring to a June poll finding. The United States wants to preserve the oil fields for the Iraqi government, which is probably wise, but it’s also true that ISIS is making a fortune off of black-market oil sales.
“What we have not yet been able to do is completely decapitate their command and control structures”, he said in part of the interview that aired on ABC’s “Good Morning America” program. “We’ve made a few progress in trying to reduce the flow of foreign fighters”.
Syria is another story entirely, the president stated, because of the political problems caused by President Bashar al-Assad.
Expounding, he said, ‘I would distinguish between making sure that the place is ideal – that’s not going to happen anytime soon – with making sure that ISIL continues to shrink in its scope of operations until it no longer poses the kind of threat that it does’.
“Despite the changing battle landscape and alterations in [President Barack] Obama’s approach over the past year, Americans’ views on the use of ground troops have not significantly changed”, the pollster said in an analysis of the results.
And he said, optically speaking, it would not behoove the United States to round up and ship millions of people out of the country. ‘Nobody thinks that that is realistic.
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“It’s very, very important to note that our capabilities now are just so vastly greater than when we did the fight to Baghdad”.
