Foreign Affairs
Related: About this forumPresident Obama Defends U.S./ISIS Strategy Following Paris Attacks at G20 Summit--Good Read + Video
(The U.S. Mainstream Media seems to be trying to sway U.S. Public Opinion back to the days of the "9/11" Attacks in USA with their frenzied coverage of the Attacks in Paris. There are the bellicose calls for more troops and a coordinated bombing frenzy in the ME even if there is widespread "collateral damage." McCain and Graham along with the usual Military Hacks and Pentagon/ Nat. Security Terrorism Pundits are calling for all out "War on ISIS" claiming Obama has failed. In this Press Conference at G20 Obama does a credible Push Back that is well needed to counter this new effort to push us deeper into wider and more aggressive conflict in the ME.)
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President Obama Defends ISIS Strategy Following Paris Attacks
"This is not conventional warfare. We play into the ISIL narrative when we act like they are a state," he said, using another acronym for the group, also known as ISIS. "We use routine military tactics that are designed to fight a state that is attacking another state. That's not what's going on here. These are killers with fantasies of glory."
Obama announced a new intelligence-sharing agreement with France, which on Sunday launched massive airstrikes against the ISIS capital of Raqqa, Syria, in retaliation for the attacks.
Obama faced increasingly skeptical questions from reporters about the administration's strategy, which has come under enormous scrutiny in the aftermath of the Paris attacks in which ISIS demonstrated the ability to extend its reach beyond the territory it controls in Iraq and Syria. "Isn't it time for your strategy to change?" Obama was asked by a reporter from Agence-France Presse.
"The strategy that we're putting forward is the strategy that is ultimately going to work," he said in response. "But as I said, it's going to take time."
Obama argued throughout the press conference that the attacks in Paris do not require a change in strategy to fight ISIS, but rather an intensification of the current approach, which includes air strikes, counterterrorism operations and humanitarian assistance for refugees.
Obama dismissed calls for increasing ground operations in Syria and Iraq, stressing that a full-scale ground engagement would be unsustainable in the long run.
"Assume that we were to send 50,000 troops into Syria," he said in response to a question. "What happens when there's a terrorist attack generated from Yemen, or Libya?"
"Folks want to pop off and have opinions on what they think they would do, present a specific plan," Obama said, referring to critics.
"If you have a handful of people who don't mind dying, they can kill a lot of people. That's one of the challenges of terrorism."
Watch Obama's press conference here:[/v]
Streamed live on Nov 16, 2015
http://mic.com/articles/128647/president-obama-defends-isis-strategy-following-paris-attacks#.mPJg6WOq4