Voters Want Ground Troops in Obama's War on Islamic State

From Andrew Malcolm, at IBD, "Voters' verdict: Obama's ISIS action plan is not good enough":

On Wednesday, President Obama sent a draft authorization for use of military power against ISIS. But already Americans say such a half-hearted assault on terrorists is not good enough.

As a political symbol (and to spread the blame when something goes wrong), Obama has asked Congress for authority to do what he's already been doing since September -- bomb ISIS as part of an international coalition and train and arm Kurds, Iraqis and Syrians.

This is authority the Nobel Peace Prize winner did not seek before attacking Libya in 2011, a successful war that also succeeded in turning that country into a lawless land of terrorist groups and marauding militias that killed four Americans in Benghazi.

But in a brief Wednesday afternoon statement on his authorization request (Scroll down for full C-SPAN video of that statement), Obama ended up saying as much about what he does not want to do.

"The resolution we’ve submitted today does not call for the deployment of U.S. ground combat forces to Iraq or Syria," Obama maintained. "It is not the authorization of another ground war, like Afghanistan or Iraq."

However, a new Rasmussen Reports poll also out Wednesday reveals for the first time that a majority of Americans are now sufficiently concerned about ISIS' barbarism and terrorist threat that it supports the use of ground combat troops again in Iraq as part of an international effort.

The poll of 800 likely voters found that 52% want to do more than Obama, 28% do not and 20% don't know.

The numbers show steady growth in support of ground troop deployment since September when 48% liked that idea and 36% were opposed. A key element in that support is involvement of other countries, especially Muslim ones.

A December Rasmussen survey found fully 79% agreeing with military experts (and disagreeing with Obama) that air assaults alone would be insufficient to defeat ISIS and U.S. ground troops would be necessary at some point.

Voters disagree by party, but not as sharply as you might expect--with 67% of Republicans favoring a ground troop commitment while a near majority of Democrats (45%) agree.

Coming just weeks after Obama boasted of withdrawing all American combat troops from Afghanistan and just four years after pulling all U.S. forces from Iraq, the Democrat is loathe to commit them again. Remember last summer when he openly confessed he had no ISIS strategy?

But some 2,500 are already back in Iraq. Obama stressed their mission is training. But they're armed and combat would seem inevitable. Canadian snipers recently engaged and dispatched an ISIS mortar crew firing on coalition forces...

Obama's the endless nightmare in the Oval Office. Americans are just counting down until they can be rid of this national embarassment.

Keep reading.

And see U.S. News, "Public Doubts Obama's ISIS Strategy."