Just One-Third of Americans Approves of Obama's Handing of Syria Crisis

It's not going well for our presidential amateur.

A New York Times poll, "Survey Reveals Scant Backing for Syria Strike."

In the Syrian crisis, 6 in 10 Americans oppose airstrikes, according to the poll, with similar majorities saying they fear military action could enmesh the United States in another long engagement in the Middle East and would increase the terrorist threat to Americans.

But the antipathy to foreign engagement extends beyond the current crisis. Sixty-two percent of the people polled said the United States should not take a leading role in trying to solve foreign conflicts, while only 34 percent said it should. In April 2003, a month after American troops marched into Iraq, 48 percent favored a leading role, while 43 percent opposed it.

When asked whether the United States should intervene to turn dictatorships into democracies, 72 percent said no while only 15 percent said yes. That is the highest level of opposition in a decade of polling on this question. At the start of the Iraq war, 48 percent favored staying out and 29 percent favored getting involved.

“A lot of people bought the idea that if we create democracy in the Middle East, the terrorists would stop coming,” said Walter Russell Mead, a professor of humanities and foreign policy at Bard College. “But that conflation has disappeared, and that makes it harder to gin up the popular support for foreign military intervention.”

For Mr. Obama, who has repeatedly ruled out sending troops to Syria and promised a “limited, tailored” operation, the findings reinforce his failure so far to make his case to the American public, which has seemed as skeptical as some of the nation’s allies.

Nearly 80 percent of those surveyed said the Obama administration had not clearly explained its objectives in Syria, while 69 percent said Mr. Obama should not go ahead with a strike without Congressional authorization. Fifty-six percent of people said they disapproved of how the president has handled Syria, while 33 percent approved.