American boots on the ground

Iraq popular forces vow to fight any US troops

Press TV,

1 December, 2015

Iraqi popular forces have pledged to combat any US troops deployed to the conflict-hit Western Asian country.

Iraq's Kata’ib Hezbollah group, Badr Movement and Asaib Ahl al-Haq (The League of the Righteous) group made the announcement on Tuesday.

"We will chase and fight any American force deployed in Iraq. Any such American force will become a primary target for our group. We fought them before and we are ready to resume fighting," said Jafaar Hussaini, spokesman for the Kata’ib Hezbollah group.

The remarks came hours after US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said that Washington will deploy special operations forces to fight the Takfiri Daesh terrorists in Iraq, with the ability to conduct raids over the border in neighboring Syria. 

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US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter listens during a hearing of the House Armed Services Committee on Capitol Hill December 1, 2015 in Washington, DC. (AFP Photo)

"These special operators will over time be able to conduct raids, free hostages, gather intelligence, and capture ISIL (Daesh) leaders," Carter said.

Since September 2014, the US along with some of its allies has been conducting air raids against what are said to be the Daesh terrorists inside Syria without any authorization from Damascus or a UN mandate. 

The air assaults in Syria are an extension of the US-led aerial campaign against purported Daesh positions in Iraq, which started in August 2014. Analysts say the attacks have failed to disband the extremists.

The foreign-backed militancy in Syria, which flared in March 2011, has left over 250,000 people dead.

Gruesome violence has also plagued some parts of Iraq ever since Daesh elements launched an offensive in June 2014, and took control of portions of Iraqi territory. 

The Takfiri militants have been committing vicious crimes against all ethnic and religious communities in Iraq, including Shias, Sunnis, Kurds, Christians and others in the ares under their control

US deploys special forces to boost fight against ISIS, poised to carry out unilateral ops into Syria

RT,

1 December, 2015

The US is set to deploy an expeditionary targeting force to help Iraq put additional pressure on Islamic State (formerly ISIS/ISIL), Defense Secretary Ash Carter said. The special forces will be positioned to conduct unilateral operations into Syria.

"These special operators will over time be able to conduct raids, free hostages, gather intelligence, and capture ISIL leaders," Carter told the House Armed Services Committee in prepared remarks, using an abbreviation for Islamic State.

"That creates a virtuous cycle of better intelligence, which generates more targets, more raids, and more momentum," he added.

There are currently about 3,400 American troops in Iraq. In November, the US announced that 50 commandos will be sent to northern Syria to advise anti-IS forces there. The Pentagon would not comment on whether those special operations troops had already arrived in the embattled country.

“Over time,” the 50 forces will conduct raids in both Iraq and Syria "to put even more pressure" on IS, Carter told the committee.

“The raids in Iraq will be done at the invitation of the Iraqi government and focused on defending its borders and building the [Iraqi Security Forces’] own capacity,” Carter said in his prepared testimony. “This force will also be in a position to conduct unilateral operations into Syria.”

Unilateral raids, which would not be sanctioned by Syrian President Bashar Assad, would represent a split from President Barack Obama’s commitment to avoid ground troops in the fight against IS.

Two-thirds of Americans believe that Obama doesn’t have a coherent strategy for combating IS, according to a mid-November poll. About half of respondents approved of sending ground troops to fight the terrorist group, and 63 percent said that such a deployment was inevitable. Only 20 percent believe airstrikes, the current weapon of choice for the US in dealing with Islamic State, will be successful in eliminating the group.

House Armed Services Chair Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) said he would support a greater commitment to US ground forces in both Syria and Iraq if they were part of a more robust strategy to bring down IS.

"The issue is okay, what would it take to really degrade and ultimately destroy ISIS?" Thornberry told USA Today. "Send however many guys or assemble whatever coalition is necessary to accomplish that goal."

However, he called the deployment of 50 commandos a half measure destined to fail.

"Fifty guys to be deployed is not going to turn the tide of this battle," he said.

In mid-November, the US began targeting at least 116 trucks used by IS to smuggle crude oil in Syria as part of a campaign to disrupt the ability of the jihadist group to generate revenue to supports its operation. The terrorist organization is reported to take in as much as $40 million a month by producing and exporting oil.

Since then, more than 40 percent of the revenue IS receives from oil has been affected by the US-led strikes, General Joe Dunford, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the committee.

"We estimate that approximately 43 percent of the revenue stream that ISIL derives from oil has been affected over the past 30 days," Dunford said.

The United States had previously refrained from striking the fleet of trucks, believed to number over 1,000, out of concern over civilian casualties. To prevent that, F-15 jets dropped leaflets prior to the attack, warning drivers to abandon their vehicles. The leaflets were followed by strafing runs an hour prior to the strikes to emphasize the message. After the strikes, US officials said that there were no immediate reports of civilian casualties.

The US heads a coalition of more than 60 countries conducting airstrikes on IS in Syria. The United States has conducted more than 95 percent of the nearly 3,000 strikes against IS targets since the campaign began in September 2014. In September, Russia launched its own bombing campaign against terrorist groups in Syria. The West has said some of the strikes target moderate anti-Assad forces, but Moscow denies the claims and insists they are only targeting terrorists.

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