Clinton explained her three-point plan in a speech at the Council on Foreign Relations on Thursday morning. The first point calls for defeating ISIS in Iraq and Syria, but not with large numbers of American troops, but instead local Sunni fighters. “Like President Obama, to I do not believe that we should again have 100,000 American troops in ground combat in the Middle East,” she said. “That is just not the smart move to make here.” (For the record, this is a bit of a straw man, as even hawkish Senator Lindsey Graham has called for only 10,000 U.S. troops.) She called on Congress to immediately pass an updated authorization of military force. Further, Clinton wants a no-fly zone, but “not an American-only no-fly zone.”
The second part of the plan calls for dismantling terrorist infrastructure around the world, targeting people who create travel documents for terrorists. She demanded Turkey lock down its border to prevent terrorists from using it as a hub. And she suggested the U.S. also take the fight to the internet. “We have to do a better job at contesting online space,” she said. “We must deny them virtual territory” as well as IRL territory. And “we need Silicon Valley not to view government as its adversary”—striking some kind of balance between sharing user information and protecting privacy.
The third part of her plan calls for greater information-sharing among allies, noting that some countries in Europe “don’t always alert each other when they turn away a suspected terrorist at the border.”