President Obama talks every day about defeating the Islamic State militants, but advisors say one option never surfaces for serious consideration – bringing the U.S. military in more directly to save the fledgling Iraqi security forces from their failures.
Obama doubled down on his approach this week in a meeting with top generals, who later stood with him at the Pentagon as he explained his conviction that a large-scale investment of U.S. troops in another fight in the Middle East is a bad idea. He insisted that his military leaders agreed.
“In every one of the conversations that we've had, the strong consensus is that, in order for us to succeed long term in this fight against ISIL, we have to develop local security forces that can sustain progress,” Obama said, using an acronym for the extremist group.
Read the full article at The Los Angeles Times.
Author
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Julianne Smith
Former Adjunct Senior Fellow, Transatlantic Security Program
Julianne (“Julie”) Smith is a contributing editor to Foreign Policy, where she coedits “Shadow Government.” She is also a senior advisor at WestExec Advisors, an adjunct senio...
