Next ‘Commander in Chief’ Is Campaign Focus Following Paris Attacks

While the world reels in shock over the Paris attacks this weekend, the focus of the presidential campaign has shifted into a test involving foreign policy experience, POLITICO reports.

This change in the campaign comes as the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks on the French capital, describing them as “the first of the storm.”

Amid the carnage of the attacks that killed at least 129 people, the media questioned candidates running for president about their foreign policy experience and how they would protect the United States from ISIS, Al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations.

With Ben Carson and Donald Trump leading in the polls, the question is now whether their lack of foreign policy experience could dislodge their perch.  

“It’s one thing to have a protest vote,” New York Republican Rep. Peter King, chairman of the Homeland Security subcommittee on counterterrorism and intelligence, told POLITICO. “If anything good can come of this tragedy, I would hope it would steer the debate toward who can handle Al Qaeda and ISIS and away from sound bites,”

On Monday, Republican presidential candidates criticized President Barack Obama’s policies regarding refugees, no-fly zones in Syria and the use of military force overseas.

Over the weekend, the Republicans trained their fire on both Obama and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for refusing to label the attackers as radical Islamists.

“I don’t understand it,” Florida Sen. Marco Rubio said on ABC’s This Week. “That would be like saying we weren’t at war with the Nazis because we were afraid to offend some Germans who may have been members of the Nazi Party but weren’t violent themselves.”

In her opening statement at Saturday’s Democratic debate in Des Moines, Clinton said this election “is not only about electing a president. It’s also about choosing our next commander in chief.”

Meanwhile, former Florida governor and GOP presidential candidate Jeb Bush called for a declaration of war against the Islamic State.

“We can’t negotiate with this threat,” Bush told Fox News. “We should have no empathy for our enemies. We should destroy them.”

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who ran for president in 2012, said another Democratic president would be dangerous. “There’s no question Hillary Clinton has a lot of experience, it’s just bad experience. … She’s just been wrong time and time again,” Romney told MSNBC.

Rubio said America’s allies should invoke the collective defense clause of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in response to the terrorist attacks.

“This is clearly an act of war and an attack on one of our NATO allies, and we should invoke Article 5 of the NATO agreement, and bring everyone together to put together a coalition to confront this challenge,” Rubio said Sunday on ABC.

Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson told Fox News Sunday that he would assemble an international military coalition involving “all of the Arab states” and “all of our traditional allies.”

“I don’t want to leave anybody out,” Carson said.

Over the weekend, Trump, who has repeatedly emphasized that he would engage in a massive bombing campaign against ISIS if elected, issued a challenge to Obama on Twitter: “When will President Obama issue the words RADICAL ISLAMIC TERRORISM?”

“We need much tougher, much smarter leadership—and we need it NOW!” Trump said.