NBC's chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel tore apart the four-point plan that President Obama laid out in his primetime Sunday speech to combat the Islamic State terrorist organization.
Appearing on Morning Joe, Engel said that the plan that Obama had laid out was to stay the course that the United States had already been on, a plan that is not working.
"He laid out these four points. One, hunt down the plotters of terrorism wherever necessary," Engel said. "I think you can accurately say that is happening and there have been drones strikes and very aggressive raids all around the world. So point one, it is happening and there is almost no way to argue against it.
"Point two, he said we are going to keep the training and equipping mission in Iraq and Syria and sending in Special Ops. That has been incredibly fraught with problems, the training and equip mission has not been going well. That's how ISIS got its weapons in the first place. Which groups get trained, which groups get equipped has been a disaster. So that one hasn't actually been working so staying the course there is problematic.
"Number three, he talked about sealing the border with Turkey. Turkey has been a major base for ISIS and that border isn't sealed. Major intelligence sharing that is probably happening to a degree and then at the end [he] sort of talked about how there was progress being made toward a cease-fire in Syria and that would bring Russia on board. That would be amazingly good but I think that is pretty far off."
MSNBC's Joe Scarborough agreed with Engel and said that Russia coming on board would be a good thing but is a long way off.
A new CNN/ORC poll showed that 67 percent of Americans said that military action against IS in Iraq and Syria is not going well. A majority of Americans, 53 percent, say that the U.S. should send ground troops to Iraq and Syria.