Both Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump came into office with the desire to end the long wars America had been fighting in the Middle East. Both had been opposed to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. President Obama chose the standard isolationist approach: withdraw U.S. forces from combat and appease adversaries. He pulled all American troops out of Iraq in 2011 and signed a "nuclear deal" with Iran in 2015 based on a generous supply of carrots. This approach proved, as usual, a failure. Non-intervention does not create peace. It creates a power vacuum that others seek to fill, with consequences the U.S. cannot ignore. President Obama ended up recommitting troops to Iraq in 2014 to confront the ISIS Caliphate and provide support for "moderate" forces in the Syrian Civil War that were attempting to overthrow Bashar al-Assad, an ally of Iran. The Syrian gambit was half-hearted and could not match the strength Iran could bring to the battlefield even...(Read Full Article)