President Barack Obama used what is expected to be his last major remarks as commander-in-chief to caution Donald Trump not to follow through on the aggressive and controversial tactics he espoused during the campaign and repeated since his Nov. 8 victory.
Without mentioning the president-elect by name, Obama dedicated his almost hour-long speech at MacDill Air Force Base, home of U.S. Special Operations Command and U.S. Central Command, to addressing plans Trump has put forth for how he would like to see America wage war, attack its enemies, and protect itself at home against perceived and real threats.
Obama’s remarks recalled several of Trump’s most controversial moments from the campaign, including his dismissal of the family of a Muslim U.S. Army soldier who died fighting in Iraq, Trump’s claim he would seize oilfields in Iraq to pay for the conflicts there, that he would order the military and intelligence officers to torture detainees and that he would enforce extra security requirements on Muslims in America.
Obama’s speech, which an aide said beforehand would “wrap up his national security record,” comes at a time of concern over how the future commander-in-chief could use the
technologically advanced and broadly lethal tools of war honed during Obama’s administration and that of his predecessor George W. Bush.
“We have to take a long view on the terrorism threat, and we have to put forward a smart strategy that can be sustained,” Obama told the hangar full of service members. He cautioned against the “false promises” of those who say that deploying U.S. forces, dropping bombs or “fencing ourselves off” can alone protect the American people from dangers overseas.
Obama offered advice, based off of what he considers successes from his tenure as president, beginning with keeping the actual threats facing the U.S. in perspective. Terrorists like the Islamic State group and others that purport to support religion through violence are not “the vanguard of a new world order,” Obama said.
“They are thugs and they are murderers and they should be treated that way,” he said. “Today’s terrorists can kill innocent people, but they don’t pose an existential threat to our nation and we should not make the mistake of elevating them to a position that they do. That does their job for them.”
Obama went on to suggest that the next president avoid military deployments unless absolutely necessary, avoid brutal forms of war and intelligence gathering like torture, and eliminate offshore detainment and prosecution. He cited his attempt to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, where 49 of the 242 men detained there during the Bush administration remain.
The president referenced the use of drones, which he said, “protects our troops and has prevented real threats to the American people.” He also mentioned rules he has imposed to limit their use, and lamented that Congress never voted on an Authorized Use of Military Force, a formal authorization to conduct war, during his tenure.
“Democracies should not operate in a state of permanently authorized war,” Obama said. He did not mention that his administration authorized the conflict in Syria by tying the Islamic State group to al-Qaida, which Congress authorized the president to combat following the 9/11 attacks in 2001. Both terrorist networks have disavowed each other.
And he stressed the need for strengthening democratic principles, both at home and abroad.
“A dollar spent on development is better than a dollar spent on fighting a war,” he said.
Obama used the opportunity to thank the forces, constituting less than 1 percent of the U.S. population, who have been asked to endure multiple deployments in the last 15 years to faraway war zones that bear no signs of peace now.
“Let my final words to you as your commander-in-chief be a reminder of what you’re fighting for, what we are fighting for,” Obama said. “The United States of America is not a country that imposes religious tests as a price for freedom, we’re a country that was founded so that people could practice their faiths as they choose.”
“We’re a nation that believes freedom can never be taken for granted, and that each of us has a responsibility to sustain it,” Obama said.
“Right makes might,” he concluded. “Not the other way around.”
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Obama Talks National Security Tenure, Calls for Restraint originally appeared on usnews.com
