Obama Foreign Policy

After events such as the Abu Ghraib Prison scandal, Obama passed this that required the army to use the field manual to torture prisoners of war.

In 2009, President Obama started the withdrawal of troops from Iraq. In 2011, all United States forces were withdrawn from Iraq, leaving the Sunni government to deal with Al-Qaeda and Shiite insurgents. Obama did this in Iraq because the unilateral approach hurt the reputation of America. In total 32,000 United States troops were injured and 4,500 were killed, but over 100,000 Iraqi deaths occurred.

In 2009, Obama criticized the Bush campaign for ignoring terrorism in Afghanistan. So, Obama sent 17,000 troops to Afghanistan to fight Al-Qaeda and the Taliban and 30,000 more in 2010. Pilotless drone attacks on Pakistan increased tensions between the world and the United States.

In 2011, Osama bin Laden was killed in a secret operation by the CIA and Navy SEALs. Questions arose over the new purpose of the United States in the Middle East. President Karzai and President Obama signed a contract that the United States would support and train troops in Afghanistan.

After the death of Osama bin Laden, America and other countries felt involvement in Afghanistan was over. President Karzai and Barack Obama signed a contract allowing the United States government to support and train Afghan troops.

This term describes the numerous amounts of protests against the government's of the Middle East. The protests originated after Obama called for peace with the Islamic world and the United States. Obama was criticized for not intervening in civil wars such as Libya and Syria. Oil-rich conservative United States allies were generally annoyed by Obama's speech as well. In total the leaders of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak was imprisoned, Libya, Muammar Gaddafi was killed, Yemen, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria, Jordan, Oman, Bahrain, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia either went to civil war or made peaceful concessions.

This war broke out during "arab spring" against the Syrian government. The United States did not get involved and President Obama was criticized for a lack of action.