WASHINGTON — President bama’s speech to reassure the nation on Sunday night included no new strategy to contain or defeat the Islamic State. In fact, it was not intended to.
Instead, Mr. Obama used a rare Oval Office address to make the case that his administration was ahead of the problem, not playing catch-up — contrary to the critiques presented by many of his former counterterrorism advisers.
He used the address to explain once again a series of incremental moves his administration has made over the past month: the Pentagon’s decisionto send Special Operations forces to Iraq and Syria; the long-awaited move to launch airstrikes on the oil tankers that provide the extremists with much of their revenue; and Secretary of State John Kerry’s high-wire diplomatic gamble, called the “Vienna process,” to halt the civil war inSyria so that all parties can focus on a common enemy.
But the speech on Sunday was mostly a plea for patience and for national unity against a threat that seemed distant and disorganized a year ago.
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