Mission Creep

President Obama has just announced an expansion of our troops fighting ISIS by another 1,500 "trainers and advisers." This brings the total of U.S. troops there to over 3,100 ... all supposedly in Iraq ... see: BBC Story. It sounds to this observer that our air war there is losing and our fearless leader now fears being embarrassed (again). So he is continuing to act recklessly cautious. Joe Scarborough on MSNBC in the AM frequently quotes Napoleon when commenting on President Obama's perpetual cold feet, "If you want to take Vienna, take Vienna!" Otherwise, don't even try.

Again Obama can't decide what he wants to do ... and, if he does know, he hasn't explained it very well to the American people. He has sworn never to put "boots on the ground" again in Iraq ... but he is clearly being driven by circumstances into a Vietnam-like mission creep. There is no doubt in my mind that there will be other deployments of troops there ... until such time as we are back to the level of soldiers that we should have left there in the first place ... actually probably more if we ever want to recapture the cities and towns that ISIS has overrun.

And, if and when we are all in, Obama has two large disadvantages ... one, he has quietly purged the Army of many of our more talented senior military commanders who knew how to win in such situations. A lot of what remains is a band of political lickspittles who, by their hesitancy and inexperience, are likely to cause quite a few more causalities than might be expected. And two, of course, this will also put tremendous pressure on our army which is being daily downsized by our Nobel Peace Prize winner. He might even have to redeploy some of his Ebola fighters from Sierra Leone for heaven's sake.

These problems are also compounded by Obama's disdain for and hesitancy to listen to his generals. I'm afraid that Obama's new Iraq war, like his Afghanistan fiasco, might not end very well.

Afterthought: It has just occurred to me that the title "mission creep" could also apply to Obama.