If this cut-and-run surprises Mr. Obama's Secretary of Defense, it shouldn't. We can expect to see more of the same skittishness, shown in various ways, from nations who either are or might have been our allies. When the United States is strong and stands by its commitments to those nations, it makes them more willing to follow our lead. But when it disappears on or even betrays its allies, they realize we are not standing behind them--and react accordingly.
With this president, every government in the world knows it is dealing with a weak sister, and that there is no U.S. foreign policy worthy of the name. Mr. Obama's shameful appeasement of the Islamists who rule Iran has encouraged them to become more aggressive in Iraq, among other places, and that has put the Sunni population there in a very difficult position. Most of them probably don't much like the evil jihadists in ISIS, but they may well consider them less of a threat than millions of Iraqi Shiites--some of whom are also jihadists--under heavy Iranian influence. Any sense that they are all countrymen and can trust each other seems to be almost completely missing.
The U.S. cannot live with ISIS, and neither can the rest of the civilized world. The ugly truth is that the people fighting for that group are fanatics who are determined to kill not only unbelievers in that region, but unbelievers like us. They have a vast safe haven, and they have plenty of money and plenty of time to draw their plans. Americans will never be safe from large terrorist attacks--possibly another 9/11, or even worse--while ISIS exists. Defeating it probably would not require killing every last person who fights for it, but it would certainly require killing most of them. It should be obvious we cannot rely on Iraqi forces to do the job, and it should also be obvious that it will not get done with the small and half-hearted air campaign that has been the main feature of the U.S. effort so far.