Is the Obama administration lying to us about the “success” we have had in fighting the brutal murderers of ISIS?
If you believe Eli Lake and Josh Rogin, writing not for some far-out Obama hating venue but Bloomberg News, the answer is yes, they are.
Here is the beginning of their just-published article (which I urge you to read in its entirety):
The war against the Islamic State has killed thousands of fighters and even some mid-level battlefield commanders, but the organization’s senior leadership and nerve center remain largely untouched, according to U.S. military and intelligence officials.
These officials and other experts tracking the terror group tell us that the Islamic State’s Shura and Sharia councils, the advisory bodies that help inform the major decisions of the group’s leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, remain intact, notwithstanding one close call in November for Baghdadi. Although airstrikes and military campaigns have killed several regional administrators and designated “governors,†the Islamic State has quickly replaced them and maintains its command-and-control capabilities.
This assessment of progress against the Islamic State differs sharply from public statements by top Obama administration officials as recently as last month, including Secretary of State John Kerry and retired General John Allen, the president’s special coordinator for the coalition against the Islamic State. In February, Allen said that half the group’s leaders in Iraq had been killed.
Asking again: is the Obama administration lying to us?
I don’t know for sure one way or the other. But I do know the Obama administration has a history of lying to us over and over again about issue after issue.
And this lie, if it is one, would be very beneficial to President Obama’s prestige and standing: remember, he was the one who said ISIS was nothing more than a “jayvee squad” little over a year ago. How embarrassing it must be that ISIS not only has become as huge as it is right now, but Mr. Obama cannot even put a significant dent in its leadership.
I hope Mr. Lake and Mr. Rogin are wrong. I would like nothing more than to believe ISIS’s “leadership”, such as it is, has been decimated.
But, given the Obama track record on honesty (dismal) and on success in foreign policy (even worse), I can’t say that I’m hopeful.
