The United States has lost its footing in a large part of the world as its foreign policy continues to falter, according to former Deputy Assistant of Defense Peter Brookes.
"The problem is at the end of the day, we're failing,'' Brookes said Tuesday on "The Steve Malzberg Show" on
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"We're failing in Syria, we've been failing for three years there. We're failing in Iraq. Russia, too, there's so many other things. I mean China, we could go on and on.''
In addition, al-Qaida is also on the rise, said Brookes, a retired U.S. Navy commander who is senior fellow of National Security Affairs at The Heritage Foundation.
"A few weeks ago … [there was] the cell phone plot — a belief that al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula … was working with operatives of ISIS or another al-Qaida affiliate up there,'' he said.
"The two put a bomb in a cell phone and in a computer on a plane bound to the U.S. from Europe.
"Now they may have stopped that, but this is what we're talking about. We always forget about things that don't happen.''
Brookes said ISIS — which is storming through Iraq and killing Christians in a bid to create an Islamic state called a caliphate — has grown stronger year by year with the U.S. doing nothing.
"ISIS has been in Iraq for a long time. They had the whole western part of the country, Anbar Province,'' he said.
"Remember the president, I guess it was earlier this year, said, 'ah, ISIS, that's the junior varsity.' And, of course, unfortunately he was wrong.
"ISIS is the varsity and they're playing in the pros of the terrorist league and they're just doing terrible things. Al-Qaida has sworn them off they're so bad.''
Brookes testified two weeks ago before Rep. Peter King and the House Homeland Security Committee.
"All of us agreed … that ISIS is a threat to the United States. I mean you heard what they said, they said they will hang an al-Qaida flag in the White House,'' Brookes said.
"Do I think that's going to happen? Probably not but the fact is that's what they're thinking and what happens between their ambitions and our reality. So this is really a problem.''
As far as the nation's relationship with Russia, it has "gone from reset to regret,'' Brookes said.
"It's been a total failure. In fact, US-Russia relations, I don't even know if they were this bad during the Cold War. That's how bad they've gotten.''
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