This article first appeared in The Lubbock Avalanche-Journal online:

President Obama admitted at the White House on Thursday, “We don’t have a strategy yet”! Obama was referring to his absence of plans for neutralizing ISIL in Syria.

Last Thursday 21 August Obama’s Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and his Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Martin E. Dempsey stated that ISIS is the worst threat we have faced and we will need to attack vigorously, including in Syria. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad stated he would cooperate, so we anticipated President Obama would be leading the World in a determined defeat of ISIS

It seemed clear that the Pentagon had a plan. We expect the Pentagon to have plans for every possible situation. We expect that our President and Commander in Chief will be able to quickly decide how to act in a given military situation.

Yesterday 28 August Obama admitted, “We don’t have a strategy yet”! Why would a military leader admit such a problem? Why would our President and Commander in Chief want to advise an enemy of our deficiencies?

President Barack Obama is working on strategies to fight Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and to continue to dissuade Russia from military involvement in Ukraine, he said Thursday from the White House.

Obama said he has directed Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel to prepare a range of options to counter ISIL and has instructed Secretary of State John Kerry to travel to the region to build a coalition in opposition to the group. Though there have been reports suggesting that broader military action in the region is imminent, the president said he would take his time.

“I don’t want to put the cart before the horse. We don’t have a strategy yet,” Obama said from the White House press briefing room.

Obama has again decided it is best to dither. The White House and Pentagon struggled mightily last Monday to dial back the rhetoric and to justify Obama’s fear of engaging ISIS. Back in January Obama called ISIS the “JV” – the Junior Varsity. It turns out it is again Obama who is the lightweight in the conflict.

Obama’s answer yesterday was honest and embarrassing. Obama is off today for a day of fundraising. He spent the last three weeks vacationing and golfing, so it is little wonder Obama is not up to speed on our national security and the condition of the World.

When it came time to discuss the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Obama said he is going to do nothing to help Ukraine, not even military rations and blankets. This is coming from our President who as a United States Senator encouraged Ukraine to disarm and assured them the United States had their back.

In fact it was Senator Barack Obama and Senator Dick Lugar who pushed to continue disarming Ukraine in 2005. Then and in 2009, Obama told Ukraine he had their back and would protect them against invasion from Russia.

As a U.S. senator, Barack Obama won $48 million in Federal funding to help Ukraine destroy thousands of tons of guns and ammunition – weapons that are now unavailable to the Ukrainian army as it faces down Russian President Vladimir Putin during his invasion of Eastern Ukraine.

In August 2005, just seven months after his swearing-in, Obama traveled to Donetsk in Eastern Ukraine with then-Indiana Republican Senator Dick Lugar, touring a conventional weapons site.

The two met in Kiev with President Victor Yushchenko, making the case that an existing Cooperative Threat Reduction Program covering the destruction of nuclear weapons should be expanded to include artillery, small arms, anti-aircraft weapons, and conventional ammunition of all kinds.

After a stopover in London, the senators returned to Washington and declared that the U.S. should devote funds to speed up the destruction of more than 400,000 small arms, 1,000 anti-aircraft missiles, and more than 15,000 tons of ammunition.

Obama does not have Ukraine’s back. Obama has said he will not commit U.S. military forces or arms to help Ukraine. It seems Obama is still in denial that Putin is acting as a normal Russian KGB leader would be expected to act. Obama just does not seem able to grasp reality.