Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin recently weighed in on President Barack Obama's speech announcing a counterterrorism campaign against the terrorist group ISIS, arguing that the government's handling of the crisis is "confusing" and "deceptive."
"[We] hear John Kerry saying we're not at war with ISIS. Well, John, ISIS is at war with us," Palin told Fox News' Sean Hannity.
"The president saying previously that ISIS could be managed. No, Barack...you don't manage a threat like this. You destroy the threat. And to claim last night also our president saying ISIS is not Islamic. ISIS says it's Islamic. They are so full of deception that America should be absolutely concerned with the policies that are going on."
On Thursday, President Obama announced an expanded military campaign against the Islamic State which includes plans to launch airstrikes across two Middle East countries, dispatch hundreds more U.S. military personnel and build a coalition of nations to ultimately "destroy" ISIS, which has as many as 31,500 fighters across Iraq and Syria. Obama also said he is working with coalition forces to turn ISIS into a "manageable problem."
However, the administration refuses to refer to the mission as a "war;" as Secretary of State John Kerry recently called it a "major counterterrorism operation" that could last a long time. The government's reluctance to label the conflicts has generated much confusion on Capitol Hill.
It's hard to find a response to that," Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., told Fox News, when asked about Kerry's comments. "Then what was the president talking about [Wednesday] night?"
McCain also said that if the president doesn't understand the difference between the Islamic State and terror networks in places like Yemen, "then ... he is oblivious to the size, shape, strength and ability of ISIS. It's like comparing a little league team to the New York Yankees."
Palin, who was the Republican Party nominee for Vice President in the 2008 Presidential election, alongside Arizona Senator John McCain, said that the President should listen to McCain's advice concerning ISIS.
"As I watched the speech last night, thought going through my mind was, I owe America a global apology because John McCain through all of this, John McCain should be our president. He had the advice, today, still giving it to Barack Obama, again, he will not listen to it, about the residual forces that must be left behind in order to secure the peace in Iraq that we had fought so hard for," said Palin.
She also compared ISIS to Hitler, and warned that the President should take the threat more seriously than viewing it as a manageable problem.
"So when Barack Obama, like the rest of us, hear these bad guys, these terrorists, promising that they will raise the flag of Allah over our White House, for the life of me I don't know why he does not take this serious, the threat. Because yes, it's more than a vision," Palin said. "They're telling-- just like Hitler did all those years ago, when a war could've been avoided, because Hitler, too, did not hide his intentions. Well ISIS, these guys aren't hiding their intentions either."
