Bernie Sanders suggested that Barack Obama is doing a “good job” in Syria during an interview Thursday on “Morning Joe.”
Sanders explained “these are enormously complicated issues. They are very difficult issues and, frankly, I think the president is doing a good job trying to sort through this and trying to make sure that we do not continue to have funerals back home for young American kids killed in combat.”
For Sanders, his Syria strategy would include working with Russia, Iran, and Saudi Arabia to get rid of Islamic State.
Mika Brzezinski: I’d like to move to Syria. Not only look at what you think we should be doing now to deal with the multiple crises there, but back when President Obama drew the red line, do you think that he handled Assad the right way? What would you have done?
Bernie Sanders: Look, as everybody knows who is not hyper partisan, these are enormously complicated issues. They are very difficult issues and, frankly, I think the president is doing a good job trying to sort through this and trying to make sure that we do not continue to have funerals back home for young American kids killed in combat. I voted against the war in Iraq, and I believe that was the right vote because this war clearly – that war has led to the destabilization of the situation right now. What I think what we have got to do right now is demand that the countries in that region, Saudi Arabia has the third largest military budget in the world. We restored the Kuwaiti Royal Family to their position in the First Gulf War. You got the UAE sitting there, which is an extraordinarily wealthy family. The first point that I would make is it is wrong to ask the United States of America alone, our armed forces, our taxpayers to put that country back together again. You need a regional force of people who are prepared to take on ISIS and destroy that barbaric organization. In terms of Assad, clearly, you have a horrendous dictator who has been at war with his own people. I would put my major priority in the area right now in getting rid of ISIS and phasing out, making sure that we get rid of Assad. It doesn’t have to happen tomorrow. I think what we have also got to do, and this is tough stuff, is work with Russia, work with Saudi Arabia, work with Iran, all of whom who have common interest in that area in opposition to ISIS.