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@@@ President Obama鈥檚 strategy against the Islamic State may be hard to pin down 鈥?maddeningly so, some complain 鈥?but it is likely to work far better than anything his bellicose critics advocate.Perhaps the president will eliminate any confusion when he addresses the nation Wednesday, but I doubt it. Based on what he told NBC鈥檚 Chuck Todd on 鈥淢eet the Press,鈥?there may be no way to reduce Obama鈥檚 fluid and perhaps deliberately ambiguous thinking to a black-or-white, all-or-nothing dichotomy.鈥淭his is not going to be an announcement about U.S. ground troops. This is not the equivalent of the Iraq War,鈥?Obama said. Later in the interview, he added that 鈥渨e鈥檙e not looking at sending in 100,000 American troops鈥?and that 鈥渙ur goal should not be to think that we can occupy every country where there鈥檚 a terrorist organization.鈥滳lear? Kind of.We understand that the president will not announce the deployment of U.S. troops in large numbers and that he does not intend for the United States to re-invade and re-occupy Iraq. But we know that U.S. military advisers and special operations teams have already been active in both Iraq and Syria. And [url=http://www.avanttravel.com/michaelkorssonline.php] michael kors handbags[/url] since Obama described the fight against the Islamic State as 鈥渟imilar to the kinds of counterterrorism campaigns that we鈥檝e been engaging in consistently over the last five, six, seven years,鈥?we can assume there will be some U.S. military presence on the ground, however covert and limited.A strong believer in multilateralism, the president asserted that 鈥渨e have, I believe, a broad-based coalition internationally and regionally to be able to deal with the problem.鈥漈rue? Again, kind of.The 10-nation coalition assembled last week to fight the Islamic State 鈥?the United States plus Australia and NATO members Britain, France, Germany, Canada, Turkey, Italy, Poland and Denmark 鈥?is much less than meets the eye, operationally speaking. Britain, France, Australia and Canada have the will and capacity to project military power overseas. The others, not so much.As far as regional cooperation is concerned, perhaps Turkey can be counted on to help tear down the Islamic State. But assistance from two key powers in the Middle East that also find themselves threatened by the jihadist group 鈥?Iran and Saudi Arabia 鈥?promises to be tenuous and situational at best.To further complicate a situation that already seems hopelessly complicated, every blow against the Islamic State is a blow in favor of Syria鈥檚 Bashar Assad and his murderous regime. But Obama implied on 鈥淢eet the Press鈥?that Assad is a secondary concern and [url=http://www.alportico.net/prodotti/christianlouboutin-sale.jkmsw.php]Christian Louboutin[/url] said that 鈥渨hen it comes to our policy and the coalition that we鈥檙e putting together, our focus specifically is on ISIL,鈥?another name for the Islamic State.In internal administration discussions, Obama has reportedly been skeptic-in-chief about the capabilities of the ostensibly 鈥渕oderate鈥?Syrian rebels. On Sunday, the president was less than fulsome in his praise of groups such as the Free Syrian Army, which he noted 鈥渉ave been on the defensive.鈥?He said 鈥渨e鈥檙e going to have to develop a moderate Sunni opposition that can control territory,鈥?indicating that no such opposition now exists.It all sounds kind of circular and vague, implying there is much that may be planned, or already taking place, that we know nothing about. Obama seems to give himself the option of [url=http://capstone.edu.sg/images/gucciusaonlineoutlet.php] cheap gucci[/url] confronting the Islamic State directly when he chooses, ignoring it when he feels it can be ignored, using airstrikes when he believes they are needed, cooperating with adversarial or unreliable governments only when he believes it is in the U.S. interest to do so.I don鈥檛 know if it will work. But I鈥檓 confident that the hawkish alternative 鈥?more bombs, more boots, more bluster 鈥?would be a tragic failure.Massive airstrikes in both Iraq and Syria probably would not be enough to destroy the Islamic State without ground support. In Iraq, such support has been inconsistent. In Syria, it could come only from Assad鈥檚 brutal army. If U.S. troops are not an option, should we encourage Saudi Arabia and even Iran to deploy their forces? To me, that sounds like fighting a fire with gasoline.To the hawks, Obama鈥檚 cautious, patient, this-could-take-years approach to dealing with the Islamic State will be emotionally unsatisfying. But, given the complexity of the situation, subtlety and indirection are more promising tools than brute force. Locking the United States into the kind of rigid strategy that critics demand would likely only ensure that this crisis sows the seeds of the next one.Copyright the Washington Post