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In iraq, obama came in very much viewed these as legacy problems that he didn t want to deal with, he wasn t elected to be a foreign policy president and we ve seen and you look at what happened with the gulf states in the last week, when is the last time in history you had the american president invite some significant allies to come to washington, four out of six don t bother to show up the week before. that s a direct response not just to the iran deal it s to a feeling that the united states is not a committed ally on the ground in this part of the world or many others. so what are our choices at this point? have we lived through some of these? i think we have. and they re three very different choices. one thing that is interesting is that foreign policy for the united states right now is obama s weakest suit. everyone understands end lindsey graham is announcing you re running for foreign policy reason you know there are problems. the three that i put out there, one is indispe ....
Groups who are muddying the waters in terms of how we imagineç going to war. so the iraqi army, yes, has totally collapsed against an army, a militia that is not even a state. and we keep hearing politicians in washington talk about we have to train the iraqi army. you know, why don t you just pick a kindergarten out somewhere in the tri-state area and give, you know train them to do something. these people have been colossal failures type ss time and time again. the irony is some of the top leaders are some of the top generals from saddam hussein s regime. basically the failures of the iraqi people, the few positive most effective people are on the isis side. if there was one area where the american officials were honest, it was that rebuilding the iraqi army was going to take a long time. the way it dissolved was ....
Training the iraqi army and building it up with armored vehicles. it is said that there are not only five brigades of the iraqi army that are combat effective. that s 15,000 troops maximum. it s already said that isis has that many men and more who are not just battle hardened but every single one of them it would seem are willing to die. so i think here and in washington and in berlin and in paris, you though,know there is real concern that the strategy frgs we can call it that, to combat isis in iraq and syria simply isn t working at the minute. bill neely, we love having you on. thank you so much for reporting to us again this morning. so dorian, 1991 we all heard the reports that the iraqi army was the fourth largest in the world the united states was going to face the fight of their lives. and they just dissolved like sugar in hot water. 2003 the same thing, right? ....
40% of world gdp. so there are some wins. but most unnerves me, not that americans don t like obama on foreign policies, if you talk to our key ally they will tell you we don t know what you stand for. we don t know what you want. we don t know if you re committed to us. and they are hedging all over the map. when the brits tell us, no we re going to join china s asian infrastructure bank even though you told us no, even though it s direct competitor to the u.s.-led world bank, what are you going to do about it. when netanyahu comes toç washington and lectures us aftero/ obama tells uss himhim not to. and the joint exercises in the sea? america is not used to this. our country is not in decline but our foreign policy sure the hell is. turning to other news, mike a, the new york times has a couple of stories i want to pass ....
Do about it. general hayden, you ve sort of outlined a policy that the vice president of the united states sort of described several years ago. the fracturing of iraq is evident to everyone. so you were talking about the only way we could maybe help the situation today. present day. is to implement more resources in a different perhaps stronger way. so my question to you, sir, ramadi has fallen. fallujah has fallen. mosul has fallen. it s memorial day weekend. section 60 will be crowded with the families of those already lost in iraq. nearly 50 years ago, secretary of state present secretary of state john kerry said in the is that the foreign relations committee with regard to vietnam, how do you ask the last person to die for a mistake. my question not just to you, sir, but to the official policymakers in washington is how many more american lives are we willing to risk and lose in ....