Indecisiveness at the top: the President dithers while the world burns.

• Author: Emord, Jonathan W.
• Position: Worldview - Barack Obama

Ask any military leader how best to defeat an enemy like the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and he will recite the need for use of overwhelming force and the element of surprise. Pres. Barack Obama's strategy on dealing with ISIS is precisely the opposite. He proceeds at a snail's pace and telegraphs to the enemy what he will do and what he will not. As in so many instances throughout his presidency, Obama is weak, indecisive, and inconsistent.

It is in the direct interest of the U.S. to eliminate (not "degrade") any foreign citizen, group, or government that sacrifices American lives. Failure to use maximum force and speed in accomplishing that mission reveals two things to a dedicated enemy: weakness and opportunity.

By proceeding with less than overwhelming force and tipping his hand, the President has placed Americans in general, and the U.S. military in particular, at far greater risk. By inaction and halting action, Obama has invited our opponents to engage in continuous acts of terror against Americans and to undertake countermeasures that make eradicating those opponents much more difficult.

Whenever terrorists kill even one American anywhere in the world, they are, by that act alone, at war with our nation. In each such instance, we need to be willing to do whatever it takes with alacrity, surprise, and overwhelming force. No one on the face of the Earth should doubt the U.S.'s resolve or ability to eliminate those who threaten its existence.

This country possesses the means to crush ISIS and to ferret out and eliminate every last one of its members and affiliates, but our military requires maximum flexibility to attain that objective. Commanders in the field need the assurance that Congress and the President fully and consistently are backing them and will give them whatever arms, materials, and manpower they require. Indeed, rather than have his chief of staff admit in response to questions from the media that we are in a state of war with ISIS, Pres. Obama should have appeared before Congress months ago and sought a formal declaration of war, as the Constitution designates.

Rather than depend on ISIS advances to dictate our responses, we must dominate the battle, influence the course of the struggle, and...