During an interview that primarily covered Obama’s foreign policy in the Middle East, correspondent Steve Kroft was combative with Obama, repeatedly asking questions about the president’s strategy on Syria, the Islamic State, and the administration’s response to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s recent military maneuvers.
Kroft interrupted the president multiple times to challenge his answers, which seemed to genuinely perturb Obama.
One of the more interesting exchanges occurred when Kroft told Obama that Putin seemed to be challenging Obama’s leadership.
Obama tried to make the case that Putin’s actions came from a source of weakness, rather than strength. Kroft quickly disagreed.
“He’s challenging your leadership, Mr. President,” Kroft repeated. “He’s challenging your leadership.”
Obama cut him off to give his definition of leadership.
“My definition of leadership would be leading on climate change, an international accord that potentially we’ll get in Paris,” Obama said. “My definition of leadership is mobilizing the entire world community to make sure that Iran doesn’t get a nuclear weapon.”
Perhaps the most contentious part of the interview was an exchange regarding the program in Syria to train and equip 5,000 moderate Syrian rebels. The Obama administration officially abandoned the program last week after months of setbacks. By the end, according to a top US general, only “four or five” US-trained rebels were active in the fight in Syria.
Kroft called the program an “embarrassment”
