Clinton, who doubled-down on President Obama’s position, told “CBS This Morning” host Charlie Rose that she “cannot conceive of any circumstances” in which to put combat troops on the ground.
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It was not immediately clear how many US special operations troops forces would be deployed. “We are not going to do that”.
Hillary Clinton doubled down on her proposed strategy to bombard ISIS militants with more airstrikes but refused to commit to putting troops on the ground in Syria and Iraq.
The U.S. and other western nations including France have weighed working more closely with Russian Federation to defeat ISIS in Syria in the wake of the Paris attacks.
In neighbouring Iraq, where about 3,500 USA troops are now advising and assisting Iraqi forces, Graham said an increased American presence would include forward air controllers and aviation assets as well as special forces to carry out raids like one last month which resulted in the first US combat death in Iraq since 2011. “They don’t have to participate in it, but I want them to understand that there has to be safe areas on the ground”, she said.
“You know, the Russians have now paid a big price”, Clinton said, referring to the downed Russian jet in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, for which ISIS claimed responsibility.
“You have to fight them in the air, you have to fight them on the ground and you have to fight them in cyberspace”.
Another key strategy Clinton advocates is a no-fly zone over northern Syria. “And it is something that is going to require a lot of cooperation”, Clinton said. “I agree with the president’s point that we’re not putting American combat troops back into Syria or Iraq”, Clinton told the CBS News in an interview on Monday.
It is tempting for the American people to regard the war against ISIS in similar terms to the long US efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan, but Graham stressed that “this is different than the last two wars”, since it would be “a large regional army with a small Western component”.
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“I want them at the table”.
