I think Obama has shown just the right amount of restraint. I don't want to see us pursue an isolationist policy either because I don't think it's realistic or that it works. I'm always reminded of what I heard President Bill Clinton say about his reluctance to get involved in Rwanda or in The Balkans back in the 1990s. Clinton said when large numbers of people are being murdered and, as the President of the United States you have the power and the resources to prevent at least some if it, it becomes very hard to say, "No." But sometimes you have to.
Kerry described Obama's thinking in an article published in
The New Yorker magazine last spring. The article was written by David Remnick, the magazine's editor and someone who knows both Kerry and Obama quite well.
Obama is aligned with the thinking of Philip Gordon, a veteran National Security Council official and Obama’s principal adviser on the Middle East from 2013 to the spring of 2015. Gordon has written:
“In Iraq, the U.S. intervened and occupied, and the result was a costly disaster. In Libya, the U.S. intervened and did not occupy, and the result was a costly disaster. In Syria, the U.S. neither intervened nor occupied, and the result is a costly disaster.”
There are limits to what the U.S. can achieve and I don't think it's disloyal or cowardly to be aware of that.
As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was much more pro-military response than Obama was. That is one area where I do have some concerns about her presidency.
