--- title: biden panetta clinton clash over isis description: High-level White House debates over Iraq and Syria are coming to light as top officials air their differences. canonical: https://time.com/3461439/biden-panetta-clinton-clash-over-isis/ author: Zeke Miller article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-10-03T17:07:43.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-19T07:47:39.145Z article:section: Politics og:title: biden panetta clinton clash over isis og:description: High-level White House debates over Iraq and Syria are coming to light as top officials air their differences. og:url: https://time.com/3461439/biden-panetta-clinton-clash-over-isis/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbcce619971dff3e8/6986a6e71eebf7c82e37309e/joe-biden-harvard.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3864 og:image:height: 2174 og:image:alt: Vice President Joe Biden speaks to students faculty and staff at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Mass. on Oct. 2, 2014. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: biden panetta clinton clash over isis twitter:description: High-level White House debates over Iraq and Syria are coming to light as top officials air their differences. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbcce619971dff3e8/6986a6e71eebf7c82e37309e/joe-biden-harvard.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Biden Takes Veiled Shot at Clinton, Panetta Over 'Inappropriate' Books > Sponsored content. 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Brief is TIME's Washington newsletter, written by senior correspondent Philip Elliott. It explains the politics, personalities and power dynamics behind the headlines, three times a week. It reaches 85,000 subscribers with a 37.0% open rate as of August 2026. #### 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. by [Zeke Miller](https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/) ## Zeke Miller Oct 3, 2014 5:07 PM UTC  Vice President Joe Biden speaks to students faculty and staff at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Mass. on Oct. 2, 2014. Vice President Joe Biden speaks to students faculty and staff at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Mass. on Oct. 2, 2014. Winslow Townson—AP by [Zeke Miller](https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/) ## Zeke Miller Oct 3, 2014 5:07 PM UTC Vice President Joe Biden blasted former members of President Barack Obama’s administration who have gone on to write “inappropriate” books about the White House. Speaking to Harvard students in a question-and-answer session Thursday, Biden was asked whether he believes the U.S. should have acted earlier in Syria, a critique leveled by former Secretary of State and likely Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, as well as former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta in recent memoirs. “The answer is no for two reasons,” Biden said. “One, the idea of identifying a moderate middle has been a chase America has been engaged in for a long time. We Americans think in every country in transition there’s a Thomas Jefferson hiding behind some rock, or a James Madison beyond one sand dune. The fact of the matter is, the ability to identify a moderate middle in Syria was—there was no moderate middle, because the moderate middle are made up of shopkeepers, not soldiers; they’re made up of people who, in fact, have—ordinary elements of the middle class of that country.” The vice president continued that it was “inappropriate” for former administration officials to write books while Obama is still in office. “And what happened was—and their history will record this, because I’m finding that former administration officials, as soon as they leave write books, which I think is inappropriate. But any rate,” Biden said as the audience chuckled. “No, I’m serious. I do think it’s inappropriate. At least give the guy a chance to get out of office.” Clinton’s book _Hard Choices_ includes details of internal deliberations where she unsuccessfully pressed President Barack Obama to arm Syrian rebels in 2012, one of the only clear denunciations she makes of the president in the book. “The risks of both action and inaction were high,” Clinton wrote. “Both choices would bring unintended consequences. The President’s inclination was to stay the present course and not take the significant further step of arming rebels.” In Panetta’s forthcoming memoir, _Worthy Fights,_ [excerpted](http://time.com/3453840/leon-panetta-iraqi-troop/) in this week’s TIME, the former Pentagon chief takes issue with Obama’s handling of the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq and the subsequent rise of ISIS in Syria. “To this day, I believe that a small U.S. troop presence in Iraq could have effectively advised the Iraqi military on how to deal with al-Qaeda’s resurgence and the sectarian violence that has engulfed the country,” Panetta writes. Left unsaid by the vice president, is that he often argued for caution against intervention in the debates highlighted by Panetta and Clinton, according to current and former officials’ accounts. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3461439/biden-panetta-clinton-clash-over-isis/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3461439/biden-panetta-clinton-clash-over-isis/"},"headline":"Biden Takes Veiled Shot at Clinton, Panetta Over 'Inappropriate' Books","datePublished":"2014-10-03T17:07:43.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-19T07:47:39.145Z","description":"High-level White House debates over Iraq and Syria are coming to light as top officials air their differences.","url":"https://time.com/3461439/biden-panetta-clinton-clash-over-isis/","keywords":["White House","Hillary Clinton","2016 Election","Barack Obama","Foreign Policy","Joe Biden","Syria"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbcce619971dff3e8/6986a6e71eebf7c82e37309e/joe-biden-harvard.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Zeke Miller","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/zeke-j-miller/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltbcce619971dff3e8/6986a6e71eebf7c82e37309e/joe-biden-harvard.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Vice President Joe Biden speaks to students faculty and staff at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Mass. on Oct. 2, 2014.","caption":"Vice President Joe Biden speaks to students faculty and staff at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Mass. on Oct. 2, 2014.","creditText":"Winslow Townson—AP","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/white-house/","name":"White House"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3461439/biden-panetta-clinton-clash-over-isis/","name":"Biden Takes Veiled Shot at Clinton, Panetta Over 'Inappropriate' Books"}}]}] ```