By Sal Bommarito

On Sunday, President Obama said to Steve Kroft on “60 Minutes” that U.S. intelligence agencies underestimated the strength of ISIS. The comment was stunning as the president failed to take any personal responsibility for the tardy U.S. response to ISIS, in effect blaming the current situation on his advisors.

In the past 48 hours, the intelligence community struck back at their president, indicating that the commander-in-chief was fully briefed that ISIS was rapidly growing more dangerous. Note: Several news outlets have published articles indicating the president did not attend many intelligence meetings.

Frankly, it’s becoming more difficult to believe that the administration is being transparent about the evolution of the decision to attack Iraq and Syria, and about the expectations of the bombing strategy. Most disconcerting is that the president disregarded advice from his intelligence advisors just as he did with his generals relating to the need for boots on the ground.

The mission behind the airstrikes is to defeat ISIS. What does this mean? Will ISIS be incapable of conducting terror activities when the bombing ends? No one knows, maybe not even the president. Yet, most people do not believe the threat of ISIS will disintegrate in one, two or three years without ground support.

The president said Al Qaeda was dead after bin Laden was killed. Not so, especially now that we know ISIS and Khoradan are branches of Al Qaeda.

What about the participation of coalition partners? None are acting militarily against Syria, even though the head of the ISIS snake is purportedly in Syria. And, the U.S. is conducting most of the attacks in Iraq as well. The Arab nations are providing only minimal support, an outrageous division of duties considering that ISIS is a much more serious threat to them than to America.

What is the real truth about Iran? Will the president agree to allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons in exchange for help in fighting ISIS? Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel thinks this a horrible strategy and said so at the United Nations yesterday.

President Obama has yet to prove that he is capable of being an effective wartime president. His communication technique always results in more questions than answers. If America is truly going to war, Americans deserve to know what the relevant facts.