President Barack Obama is "piddling around" with small-scale airstrikes in Syria against the Islamic State — especially after the Paris attacks — compared with Operation Desert Storm and other battles, former CIA Director James Woolsey told
Newsmax TV on Tuesday.
"I don't understand what he's doing or why," Woolsey, chairman of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, told "Newsmax Now" hosts John Bachman and Miranda Khan. "He does not appear to be taking this seriously enough to actually use effective force.
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"Air power isn't the only thing that would work in that part of the world," he added. "You've going to have to have some Special Forces down at the battalion level with allied troops such as Kurds and Jordanians and others."
Woolsey reflected on Desert Storm in 1991 and the U.S. role in the NATO air strikes to stop Yugoslavian President Slobodan Milosevic from committing atrocities against civilians in Kosovo eight years later.
The United States flew 1,100 sorties a day against Iraqi President Saddam Hussein during Desert Storm, while NATO forces bombed Yugoslav soldiers for 78 days.
"But if you look at air power, back in Desert Storm, we launched thousands of sorties a day," Woolsey told Newsmax TV. "In '99, when we were blocking Milosevic from massacring the Kosovars, we hit the Serbs with hundreds of sorties a day.
"In Syria, the Americans were averaging five sorties a day. It's now up to eight — and one day, they made it to 12.
"That is not conducting an air war," Woolsey said. "That's piddling around."
In a later interview with "Newsmax Prime" host J.D. Hayworth, Woolsey said that the likelihood of Washington D.C. being attacked by ISIS is "definitely above 50-50" and that much of the United States is not prepared for any assault.
"Are we prepared? No," he told Hayworth. "Are some people prepared? Yes, but it's not entirely clear of course what to prepare for.
"We're all going to be learning together — and I'm afraid one group that will learning will be the law-enforcement authorities and others, because this is a different kind of matter than has cropped up in the past."
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