Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernard Sanders said Wednesday that the United States should not take a leading role in the war against the terrorist army known as Islamic State.
He said Middle East countries should “step up” and lead the fight to turn back the advancing Islamist terrorists in Iraq.
“At the end of the day … I do not believe the United States can or should lead the effort in that part of the world. What is taking place now is a war for the soul of Islam,” Mr. Sanders said on NPR’s Diane Rehm Show.
Mr. Sanders, an avowed socialist from Vermont, said that countries such as Saudi Arabia, which has the third-largest defense budget in the world, Turkey, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates should “step up to the plate and lead.”
He said the United States and Western countries would play a supporting role.
Mr. Sanders’ comments come as President Obama is considering a Pentagon proposal to send 400 more U.S. troops to beef up the training of Sunni forces in Iraq, hoping to turn back advances by the Islamic State, which is also known by the acronyms ISIS or ISIL.
SEE ALSO: Obama admits: We don’t have a complete strategy to fight Islamic State
The proposed build-up follows criticism of Mr. Obama saying Monday that he doesn’t yet have a “complete strategy” to combat the Islamic State.
“I think everyone understands ISIS is a barbaric organization and that they must be defeated,” said Mr. Sanders, though he added it wasn’t worth the cost of getting the U.S. drawn into another Middle East war.
“But here is my nightmare, and I see it moving forward every day,” he said. “You have a lot of Republicans who apparently did not learn anything from the never-ending war in Afghanistan, learned nothing from what happened in Iraq and want us in perpetual warfare in the Middle East. I’m strongly opposed to that.”
Mr. Sanders’ is waging a long-shot campaign to overtake front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton for the Democratic nomination.
• S.A. Miller can be reached at smiller@washingtontimes.com.
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