(CNSNews.com) – Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) said that Wednesday's mass shooting at a social service center in southern California “underscores that we are at war and need a wartime president.”

Cruz began his speech at the Republican Jewish Coalition 2016 Presidential Candidates Forum on Thursday with a moment of silence honoring the victims of yesterday's bloody attack in San Bernardino, Calif.

A Muslim couple - Syed Farook, 28, and his Saudi-born wife, Tashfeen Malik, 27 - were reportedly wearing tactical gear and Go-Pro cameras strapped to their body armor during the rampage that that killed 14 people and wounded more than a dozen others. They were both killed in a shootout with police less than two miles from the scene of the attack.

President Obama told journalists in the Oval Office that it was “possible this was terrorist-related,” but added that it was also possible that the mass shooting was an example of workplace violence.

"At this point, the details of what happened at San Bernardino are still uncluear, but our prayers are with the families of those who were murdered or those who were shot," Cruz said. “And all of us are deeply concerned that this is yet another manifestation of terrorism, radical Islamic terrorism here at home.

"Coming on the wake of the terror attack in Paris, this horrific murder underscores that we are at a time of war. Whether or not the current administration realizes it or is willing to acknowledge it, our enemies are at war with us. And I believe this nation needs a wartime president to defend it.”

Cruz also criticized President Obama for saying at a recent press conference in Antalya, Turkey that “what I’m not interested in doing is posing or pursuing some notion of American leadership or America winning or whatever other slogan they come up with that has no relationship to what is actually going to work to protect the American people and the protect the people in the region who are getting killed and to protect our allies and people like France. I’m too busy for that.”

“In recent weeks president Obama traveled abroad to explain that he doesn’t believe in American leadership, that he doesn’t believe in America winning, quote, ‘I don’t have time for that’,” Cruz said at Thursday’s candidate forum.

“You know, I’ve got to say, FDR, and JFK, and Ronald Reagan were spinning in their graves to hear an American president say he doesn’t believe in American leadership or America winning.

“I’ll tell you when it comes to radical Islamic terrorism, I think our strategy, to borrow a page from Ronald Reagan in the Cold War, should be very simple: We win, they lose."