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September 22, 2014
Former Obama Administration Secretary of Defense and Director of the CIA Leon Panetta: ISIS Grew Because We Left Iraq Too Soon, And Didn't Get Involved in Syria Until Too Late
I question the latter statement but Leon Panetta does fault Obama's fecklessness for the rise of ISIS.
"I really thought that it was important for us to maintain a presence in Iraq," Panetta told CBS News host Scott Pelley. "The decision was that we ought to at least try to maintain 8,000 to 10,000 U.S. troops there, plus keeping some of our intelligence personnel in place, to be able to continue the momentum in the right direction.
"And frankly, having those troops there I think would've given us greater leverage on [former Iraq Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki] to try to force him to do the right thing as well," Panetta noted.
But it was politically popular and won the daily cycle on Twitter so that's what's important.
Short video at the link.