Obama sees Iraq as part of a wider theatre of war and potential wars engulfing the entire Middle East, where US strategic goals and interests are at stake.
In New York, Twitter is a common mode of communication between youth gangs, said a Harlem pastor, Vernon Williams, who monitors the online messages of various "crews" in an effort to head off potential wars.
Just after Mr Hagel set out his ideas, the vice-chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff told Congress about the Pentagon's revised plans for potential wars around the world.
Knowing that it is better to head off international crises than to clean up after them, the Clinton administration promised to detect potential wars early on; and United Nations people wished grandly for a UN army that would intervene at the first whiff of trouble.
Buying time -- in the opinion of some -- has come to the benefit of the Obama administration, which has set out to achieve the goals of withdrawing from centers of tension and from the sites of potential wars.
