--- title: Dick Cheney Slams Barack Obama on Iraq description: The former Vice President says the recent gains of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria are President Obama’s fault canonical: https://time.com/2892598/cheney-blames-obama-foreign-policy-iraq-afghanistan/ author: David Stout article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-06-18T06:36:15.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-21T08:28:34.017Z article:section: Politics og:title: Dick Cheney Slams Barack Obama on Iraq og:description: The former Vice President says the recent gains of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria are President Obama’s fault og:url: https://time.com/2892598/cheney-blames-obama-foreign-policy-iraq-afghanistan/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt08dad47fbc81c54b/69869809810bbbc547c92373/dick-cheney.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1500 og:image:height: 844 og:image:alt: Dick And Lynne Cheney Participate In Book Discussion In Washington og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Dick Cheney Slams Barack Obama on Iraq twitter:description: The former Vice President says the recent gains of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria are President Obama’s fault twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt08dad47fbc81c54b/69869809810bbbc547c92373/dick-cheney.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Cheney on Obama's Foreign Policy: 'Rarely Has a U.S. President Been So Wrong About So Much' > Sponsored content. 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Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. by [David Stout](https://time.com/author/david-stout/) ## David Stout Jun 18, 2014 6:36 AM UTC  Former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney talks about his wife Lynne Cheney's book James Madison: A Life Reconsidered in Washington on May 12, 2014 Former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney talks about his wife Lynne Cheney's book James Madison: A Life Reconsidered in Washington on May 12, 2014 Win McNamee—Getty Images by [David Stout](https://time.com/author/david-stout/) ## David Stout Jun 18, 2014 6:36 AM UTC Dick Cheney took off the gloves and let his dukes fly in an all-out assault on President Obama’s foreign policy decisions in the Middle East, in a scorching column published in the _Wall Street_ _Journal_ on Tuesday. In the op-ed, penned with his pundit daughter Liz, former Vice President Cheney places the precipitous collapse of the Iraqi state, and the renewed civil war in the country, squarely on the shoulders of the Obama Administration. “Rarely has a U.S. President been so wrong about so much at the expense of so many,” writes Cheney. “Too many times to count, Mr. Obama has told us he is ‘ending’ the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — as though wishing made it so.” Cheney cites Obama’s decision to withdraw all military forces from Iraq as one of the principal reasons why the country is again enmeshed in conflict. “Mr. Obama had only to negotiate an agreement to leave behind some residual American forces, training and intelligence capabilities to help secure the peace,” writes Cheney. “Instead, he abandoned Iraq and we are watching American defeat snatched from the jaws of victory.” The column comes a week after the seizure of a string of cities across northern Iraq by former al-Qaeda affiliate the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. Sunni militias are reportedly inching closer to Baghdad in what analysts predict will lead to massive bloodshed. Cheney is largely credited during his tenure in office with being one of the chief architects of the 2003 Iraq invasion, which in turn unleashed a crippling civil war in the country. A mammoth counterinsurgency effort by the U.S. in 2007 succeeded in securing cease-fires with Sunni and Shi‘ite militias and for a time appeared to have wiped out al-Qaeda-affiliated forces in Iraq. However, those gains were reversed when the U.S. withdrew its military forces from the country in 2011. Cheney’s complete column can be read [here](http://m.us.wsj.com/articles/dick-cheney-and-liz-cheney-the-collapsing-obama-doctrine-1403046522). ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/2892598/cheney-blames-obama-foreign-policy-iraq-afghanistan/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/2892598/cheney-blames-obama-foreign-policy-iraq-afghanistan/"},"headline":"Cheney on Obama's Foreign Policy: 'Rarely Has a U.S. President Been So Wrong About So Much'","datePublished":"2014-06-18T06:36:15.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T08:28:34.017Z","description":"The former Vice President, who spearheaded the plans to invade Iraq in 2003, says President Obama is responsible for the recent gains of Sunni extremists militias in the country","url":"https://time.com/2892598/cheney-blames-obama-foreign-policy-iraq-afghanistan/","keywords":["Foreign Policy","Iraq","Terrorism","ISIS","President Barack Obama","dick cheney","vice president","George Bush"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt08dad47fbc81c54b/69869809810bbbc547c92373/dick-cheney.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"David Stout","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/david-stout/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt08dad47fbc81c54b/69869809810bbbc547c92373/dick-cheney.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Dick And Lynne Cheney Participate In Book Discussion In Washington","caption":"Dick And Lynne Cheney Participate In Book Discussion In Washington","creditText":"Win McNamee—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/foreign-policy/","name":"Foreign Policy"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/2892598/cheney-blames-obama-foreign-policy-iraq-afghanistan/","name":"Cheney on Obama's Foreign Policy: 'Rarely Has a U.S. President Been So Wrong About So Much'"}}]}] ```