With the nation fixated on the Democrats’ convention in Charlotte, half a world away the United States is frittering away its twin victories in the Middle East.
The latest indication of US weakness: Iraq is allowing Iran to use its airspace to airlift supplies and weapons to help prop up Bashar al-Assad’s embattled government in Syria.
The Obama administration — in the increasingly comic and ineffectual figure of Vice President Joe Biden — has “registered its concern” about the overflights, to which the Iraqis have basically replied: Stuff it.
No surprise: Under President Obama, US troops unceremoniously exited from Iraq — after a war that cost nearly $1 trillion billion and more than 4,400 American lives — without a proper status of forces agreement. The last 500 American troops slunk away under cover of darkness last December, leaving behind a new embassy and a few consulates, plus about 5,000 “defense contractors” (mercenaries) — and almost zero leverage.
