Back in his 2012 presidential campaign, Rick Perry delivered a less-remembered debate flub when he claimed that Turkey, a NATO member, was led by “what many would perceive to be Islamic terrorists.”
The remarks caused an international incident, as the State Department scrambled to condemn Perry’s allegation. Perry’s campaign responded by defending his claim that Turkey is led by terrorists and saying that NATO should consider kicking the country out of the alliance.
As he approaches the next presidential campaign cycle, however, Perry seems to be changing his tune, as he is now saying that Turkey is an ally that, if he were to be elected president, he would want to work with in the fight against ISIS.
“You go put together a coalition with our Arab allies with the sole intent of defeating ISIS,” Perry told David Brody of CBN. “For 1,300 years the Sunnis and the Shias have been fighting each other. We need to stay out of that fight, but what we do need to do is go find our friends, our allies in the Middle East, whether it’s Jordan, whether it’s Saudi Arabia, whether it’s Turkey, whether it’s Israel, create that coalition and put together the effort to go eliminate, to extinguish this ISIS, this radical Islam movement that is tearing apart the entirety of the Middle East.”
Of course, Obama has put together an anti-ISIS coalition which has been endorsed by all of the countries Perry mentioned.
