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All the coverage the past few weeks has centered on the midterm election and the crisis with regard to ISIS has been largely forgotten.

In August, President Obama launched military operations against ISIS in Iraq, and then in September the president began to attack ISIS in Syria, since then the president’s strategy is to “degrade and eventually destroy” the Islamic State.

Since military operations began national security and military experts have stated air strikes alone will not accomplish the mission articulated by the president, there has to be a ground force to roll back the Islamic State.

The Washington Institute for Near East Policy has listed three major issues facing the U.S. as it tries to formulate a cohesive strategy.  First the U.S. has to deal with the resiliency of ISIS and the complexity of the Middle East environment.

The second aspect the U.S. has to deal with the limited weakness of our partners on the ground, and finally the United States has allocated insufficient resources with unrealistic objectives.

Continuing, Obama’s reluctance to adequately resource the effort to defeat ISIS and refused to commit U.S. ground forces to the effort, has limited U.S. military options, but this may change in the months ahead.

The question which needs to be addressed is what strategy will the U.S. pursue in the months ahead to defeat and destroy ISIS?

The midterm elections have sucked the air out of any and all coverage of the ongoing crisis in Iraq and Syria, but unfortunately the crisis continues.

The situation cannot be managed and left to the next president no matter who he or she will be, this crisis will continue unabated and will have to be dealt with.

No matter what happens during Tuesday’s election, the president will be severely weakened, even if the Republicans do not win control of the Senate.  If the Republicans win control of the Senate this definitely weakens the president further.  Obama has to begin thinking of articulating a different approach as the air campaign will not defeat and destroy ISIS without a viable ground game.

Presently, the neither Iraqi army nor Kurdish forces are able to defeat the better armed and led ISIS fighter.  On Monday it has been reported ISIS has killed over 300 members of the Albu Nimr Sunni tribe who were out gunned by the better equipped Islamic militants, as this Sunni tribe have received little support from the Iraqi government and the international community.

Without a viable ground game the president’s strategy will fail, so the question is what strategy will the president pursue?