In January 2014, Obama dismissively declared ISIS the “JV Team”. A year later, once the threat became so clear even Obama was forced to acknowledge it, Obama insisted the fight against ISIS would “not be quick," either abroad or at home. A couple years, billions of dollars spent, lives forfeited, “ISIS remained a threat as it held land in Iraq and Syria that equaled the size of West Virginia, ruled over as many as 8 million people, controlled oilfields and refineries, agriculture, smuggling routes and vast arsenals. It ran a brutal, oppressive government, even printing its own currency.”
This prompted then candidate Trump to promise, “I will…quickly and decisively bomb the hell out of ISIS” and “We will not have to listen to the politicians who are losing the war on terrorism." Compare Trump’s results vs Obama:
Just over a year later, ISIS has been routed from Iraq and Syria with an ease and speed that's surprised even the men and women who carried out the mission. Experts say it's a prime example of a campaign promise kept. President Trump scrapped his predecessor’s rules of engagement, which critics say hamstrung the military, and let battlefield decisions be made by the generals in the theater, and not bureaucrats in Washington.
<sarcasm>
Let battlefield decisions be made by generals in the theater? What a great idea! Why didn’t Obama think of that? Genius level stuff there.</sarcasm>
The leadership team that is in place right now has certainly enabled us to succeed,” Brig. Gen. Andrew Croft, the ranking U.S. Air Force officer in Iraq, told Fox News. “I couldn’t ask for a better leadership team to work for, to enable the military to do what it does best.”
President Trump gave a free hand to Mattis, who in May stressed military commanders were no longer being slowed by Washington “decision cycles,” or by the White House micromanaging that existed President Obama. As a result of the new approach, the fall of ISIS in Iraq came even more swiftly than hardened U.S. military leaders expected.
This demonstration of leadership is a tour de force of how it’s done. What Obama couldn’t get done in years, Trump does in months:
I was not optimistic when Trump first came to the office,” Rasool said. “But after a while I started to see a new approach, the way the U.S. was dealing with arming and training. I saw how the coalition forces were all moving faster to help the Iraq side more than before. There seemed to be a lot of support, under Obama we did not get this.”
Barely 2 hours before this post:
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi announced Iraqi forces were in full control of the country’s border with Syria during remarks at a conference in Baghdad, and his spokesman said the development marked the end of the military fight against ISIS.
A senior military commander confirmed to The Associated Press that combat operations had been completed.
Like or hate Trump, the man gets results and delivers on his promises, what a refreshing change.
