Former CIA Director James Woolsey said Sunday that despite the United States’ shared interest with Iran in defeating the Islamic State in Iraq & Syria (ISIS), America’s strategy should be to weaken Tehran.

“These are tactical decisions. We had a tactical decision in 1941 whether to sign on with Stalin against Hitler and we did. And it was good that we did,” Woolsey told CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS.”

“Sometimes you have to ally temporarily with a bad guy in order to defeat another bad guy,” he added.

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Zakaria had previously noted that President-elect Donald Trump Donald John TrumpOmar fires back at Trump over rally remarks: 'This is my country' Pelosi: Trump hurrying to fill SCOTUS seat so he can repeal ObamaCare Trump mocks Biden appearance, mask use ahead of first debate MORE appears to be “just fine” with Iran’s role in fighting ISIS.

Woolsey, a prominent critic of Iran who served as the director of the CIA from 1993-1995, reiterated that the overall strategy should be focused on Iran.

“I think Iran is our main problem in that part of the world and I think that it’s going to be for some time because it’s a theocratic totalitarian set of revolutionaries and, I’d say, imperialists. They want to build an empire,” he said.