While it may not be a "battle cry of freedom," former CIA Director James Woolsey says that President Barack Obama is "heading in the right direction" with his plan to combat the Islamic State (ISIS), but he needs to admit that we are at war.
The president and those in his administration need to stop referring to the pending war as a counterterrorism effort, Woolsey told J.D. Hayworth on "America's Forum" on
Newsmax TV Friday.
"We should stop using narratives and just say what happened," he explained. "Narrative is a terrible word in these circumstances because it really means the story they want to put out as distinct from what's actually happening."
Vote Now: Should Obama Order Strikes on ISIS in Syria? Vote Here
Story continues below video.
Note: Watch Newsmax TV now on DIRECTV Ch. 349 and DISH Ch. 223
Get Newsmax TV on your cable system – Click Here Now
Woolsey does think that Obama is at least "beginning to be heading in the right direction."
However, "the idea that we're going to be able to do this solely from the air is just not so," he explained.
"We may not need large military units fighting in a tradition fashion, but Special Forces, SEALs, Army rangers, CIA officers helping put together ways to advise and oversee our allies are all going to be necessary," he said.
"Sometimes you can do a lot with air power, but here we are going to need to go beyond air power," he added.
The former CIA director said that while a "small number of CIA and Special Forces folks in Afghanistan shortly after 9/11 did a phenomenal job and was very effective, we probably will not be able to get by with a limited set of numbers as that."
Vote Now: Should Obama Order Strikes on ISIS in Syria? Vote Here
"Since we haven't been on the ground in Syria, we're going to have to take some rather urgent steps to be able to run targeting and intelligence support for allied units and the rest," Woolsey said.
The CIA said Thursday that ISIS could have
more than 30,000 fighters in their ranks, but Woolsey explained that "numbers on something like terrorists groups are really hard to stay on top of and they can change relatively rapidly."
"The main thing is the trend," he said. "If the trend is negative from our point of view, whatever the exact numbers, we have to change what we're doing and get on top of the situation so that people on the other side get discouraged."
"When you're at war, and we have to admit that we are here, the objective is to demoralize the enemy," Woolsey added.
© 2025 Newsmax. All rights reserved.