--- title: President Obama to Tout National Security Record in Tampa description: President Obama will travel to Tampa on Tuesday to deliver his last major national security speech as Commander-in-Chief canonical: https://time.com/4591361/president-obama-national-security-speech/ author: Maya Rhodan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-12-06T15:33:43.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-07T06:55:56.981Z article:section: Politics og:title: President Obama to Tout National Security Record in Tampa Speech og:description: President Obama will speak at MacDill Air Force Base og:url: https://time.com/4591361/president-obama-national-security-speech/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc67f34a37bbb1a1b/6988b0e0e20a870675a93717/gettyimages-607798016.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3600 og:image:height: 2025 og:image:alt: Investigation Continues Into Bombing In New York's Chelsea Neighborhood og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: President Obama to Tout National Security Record in Tampa Speech twitter:description: President Obama will speak at MacDill Air Force Base twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc67f34a37bbb1a1b/6988b0e0e20a870675a93717/gettyimages-607798016.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # President Obama to Tout National Security Record in Tampa Speech > Sponsored content. 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It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, twice a week. #### Where can I get analysis of Washington politics by email? D.C. Brief is TIME's free Washington politics newsletter, available at time.com/newsletters. It is written by a TIME senior correspondent who covers the capital full time. #### Who writes TIME's D.C. Brief? Philip Elliott, a senior correspondent at TIME, writes D.C. Brief. #### Is D.C. Brief free? Yes. D.C. Brief is free at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3/newsletters?i=362b1cc3-607a-4d88-8109-14244bbdd593&cr=time-nl-dcbrief-2026q3-v1) ## Video: President Obama Delivers Last Major National Security Speech [Watch (HLS stream): President Obama Delivers Last Major National Security Speech](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/cHKOaLU0.m3u8) (2:22)  _Published 2016-12-06. President Barack Obama gave his last major national security speech as Commander-in-Chief on Tuesday. He summed up his administration’s counter-terrorism efforts over the past eight years._ by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Dec 6, 2016 3:33 PM UTC by [Maya Rhodan](https://time.com/author/maya-rhodan/) ## Maya Rhodan Dec 6, 2016 3:33 PM UTC [President Obama](http://time.com/4590087/kennedy-center-honors-2016-barack-michelle-obama/) will travel to Tampa on Tuesday to deliver his last major [national security](http://time.com/4576532/donald-trump-michael-flynn-mike-pompeo/) speech as Commander-in-Chief. Obama will spend the bulk of the speech defending his military record and approach to counterterrorism over the past eight years, according to [White House](http://time.com/4588032/white-house-app-dollar-bill/) officials. The president will speak from MacDill Air Force Base, home of the U.S. Central Command and U.S. Special Operations Command teams. The Obama administration prides itself on how the White House has handled conflicts abroad. When Obama took office, there were 180,000 troops on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now, there are 15,000, and leaders of major terrorist organizations like al-Qaeda have been killed by U.S. forces. Yet threats remain in the form of terrorist networks like ISIS, which took credit for an attack on Ohio State University’s campus last week and attacks on cyber networks. Republicans have been critical of the Obama administration strategy given the ongoing conflict in Syria and the troubling state Iraq is in today. On Tuesday, White House aides say Obama will review the administration’s efforts to defeat ISIS, an approach National Security Advisor for Strategic Communications Ben Rhodes says “represents a break from” the approach that was taken in Iraq and Afghanistan due to the fact that there has been no large deployment of troops though there are military forces throughout the region leading the fight. White House aides say the speech had been planned since October, before Donald Trump was voted to succeed the president. And yet given Trump’s lack of experience in government positions of power, the speech will be President Obama’s last major opportunity to make public a case for the approach he’d hope his successor would follow. The White House argument is that utilizing partners on the ground in various region “less resources spent, less casualties,” in their view that has strengthened the U.S.’s standing across the globe. Stepping away from “enhanced interrogation techniques,” or torture, in favor of utilizing the justice system, has strengthened us, not harmed us, Rhodes said Monday. “Our greatest strength against terrorism is who we are as a country,” he said. ## Transcript I was just told that was going to be the last Hail to the Chief on the road and it got me kind of sentimental. As we speak, ISIL faces an offensive on Mosul from Iraqi troops and coalition support. That's the largest remaining city that it controls. Meanwhile in Syria, ISIL's self declared capital in Raqqa is being squeezed. We have attacked ISIL's financial lifeline, destroying hundred of millions of dollars of oil and cash reserves. The bottom line is we are breaking the back of ISIL, we are taking away its safe havens and we have [ APPLAUSE ] And, and we've accomplished all this at a cost of $ 10 billion over two years. Which the same amount that we use to spent in one month at the height of the Iraq war. We should take great pride in the progress that we've made over the last state years No foreign terrorist organization has successfully planned and executed an attack on our homeland. [ APPLAUSE ] And it's not because they didn't try. So rather than offer false promises that we can eliminate terrorism by dropping more bombs, or deploying more and more troops, or fencing ourselves off from the rest of the world, we have to take a long view of the terrorist threat. 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