"Indeed, stripped to its essence, what the President has outlined isn't some grand strategy to transform the region or even to "ultimately destroy" ISIS; it's a much narrower transactional one to protect the homeland. And here's why," writes Aaron David Miller and Jason Brodsky.
(CNN) -- Think that President Barack Obama has done a back flip on Iraq and Syria, gotten that old-time religion and is now a convert to the "let's kill them wherever we find them" approach of his predecessors? Think again, or at least lay down until the feeling passes.
Indeed, stripped to its essence, what the President has outlined isn't some grand strategy to transform the region or even to "ultimately destroy" ISIS; it's a much narrower transactional one to protect the homeland. And here's why:
The speech the President gave is quite consistent with who he is and what his priorities have been all along, particularly relating to counterterrorism. Sure he's now morphed from a desire to avoid militarizing the U.S. role in Syria to a new willingness to do so. But the reason he's traveled down that road is critical.
It's not some ideological crusade, fascination with nation-building or democratization of a new Middle East.
ISIS now poses a threat to the homeland, a contingency that could not only directly threaten Americans but destroy his presidency as well. And the one area where Obama has been prepared to be ready to take on risk is in counterterrorism.
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