Former Iraqi ambassador to the United States, Lukman Faily, previously told Al-Monitor, "The superficiality of the US-Iraqi relationship [under the Obama administration] is one of the reasons [IS] was allowed to run rampant for as long as it did." Faily criticized the United States for being reckless about decisive actions to repel terrorists and failing to prevent them from committing major humanitarian crimes in the past two years.
Faily said that Iraqi officials, including former Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari and former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, visited the United States in 2013 asking for assistance to hit IS camps in the Iraqi desert, back when IS was preparing to expand their control in Iraq and Syria. Yet the United States did not take these warnings seriously and did not provide any support for Iraq during that critical time.
Also, the complete withdrawal of US forces from Iraq in 2011 occurred under Obama, causing a security vacuum in the country and allowing terrorist groups to restructure their ranks in a stronger and fiercer organization. Al-Monitor learned from one of Maliki's close advisers, who declined to be named, that "Maliki insisted that a number of US troops remain to ensure security, but Obama had strongly rejected it."
During his campaign, Trump criticized the withdrawal from Iraq, where the United States was in control of the situation, particularly in Mosul. Yet it lost Iraq after the withdrawal of its troops in 2011 in exchange for nothing. In Trump's opinion, the United States should have kept its troops in place to prevent the emergence of IS and prevent Iran from controlling Iraq.
Even after the fall of Mosul in June 2014, when IS descended on central and southern Iraq, the Obama administration's assistance was not serious and sufficient enough to repel the IS onslaught and prevent disasters and genocides from taking place — similar to what happened to the Yazidis in Sinjar and to Christian and Shiite minorities in Ninevah and other provinces.
We had a choice between the corrupted Hillary Clinton or President Elect Donald Trump and I chose against the establishment. I have supported Mr. Trump since he announced he was running for presidency and my choice was very firm. He loves this country more than all of the presidential candidates placed together. He would have never allowed Daeah to prolong and would have held the accomplices responsible.