Engel: Many in Military View Obama’s Middle East Policy as ‘Incoherent’

Friday on MSNBC’s “NewsNation,” NBC News’ chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel said many in the military and policy analysts have told him the Obama administration’s Middle East policies are “incoherent.”

Engel said, “It is actually more contradictory than that, because in Syria you have the U.S. fighting both with Iran and against Iran in the same country. So there’s an incredibly convoluted dynamic under way now where the U.S. is negotiating. On one hand, that’s probably the biggest story right now—that the U.S. is negotiating in Switzerland to come up with some sort of comprehensive deal with Iran, which would see Iran put brakes on the nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions. While we are negotiating in one country, we are fighting or supporting a fight against Iran in Yemen—the fight that’s now led by Saudi Arabia. We are fighting both with and against Iran in Syria and fighting with Iran in Iraq. So there are many people who I have spoken to, many in the military, many policy analysts, who say what we are seeing here is incoherent policy regarding not just Iran, but regarding the Middle East in general.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN

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