President Obama has "spent more time" on the issue of drone warfare than any other national security issue over the past year, the New York Times reports:
While part of the re-evaluation was aimed at the next president, it was also about Mr. Obama’s own legacy. What became an exercise lasting months, aides said, forced him to confront his deep conflicts as commander in chief: the Nobel Peace Prize winner with a "kill list," the antiwar candidate turned war president, the avowed champion of transparency ordering operations over secret battlegrounds. He wanted to be known for healing the rift with the Muslim world, not raining down death from above.
Over the past year, aides said, Mr. Obama spent more time on the subject than on any other national security issue, including the civil war in Syria. The speech he would eventually deliver at the National Defense University became what one aide called "a window into the presidential mind" as Mr. Obama essentially thought out loud about the trade-offs he sees in confronting national security threats.
Over the past year, Iran has pushed ahead with its nuclear program, which Western sanctions have not deterred. The death toll in the Syrian civil war has eclipsed at least 80,000 and may be as high as 120,000. The conflict has spread its reach beyond Syria borders, as well; Iran and Hezbollah are now "propping up" Syrian president Bashar al-Assad according to British foreign secretary William Hague.