“There is no need for foreign ground combat troops”, Iraqi prime minister Haider al-Abadi said in a statement.
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“In full coordination with the government of Iraq, we’re deploying a specialised expeditionary targeting force to assist Iraqi and Kurdish Peshmerga forces and to put even more pressure on ISIL”, Carter said on Tuesday.
The United States already has about 3,500 troops in Iraq, but their mission is to “train and advise” local forces.
But there is growing acknowledgement in the Pentagon that it is impossible to effectively fight the IS group without some U.S. ground presence.
“Iraqi special forces, the counter-terrorism force and other heroic Iraqi combatants have played a key role in targeting the leaders of Daesh and undertaken unsafe missions in order to seize back vital and strategic areas from the terrorists of Daesh”, it said.
In October, U.S. special operations troops and Iraqi forces raided a compound in northern Iraq freeing about 70 Iraqi prisoners who were facing execution.
The force is separate from a previously announced deployment of up to 50 USA special operations troops in Syria to coordinate on the ground with U.S.-backed rebels fighting in a civil war raging since 2011. A US soldier was killed during the operation. No timetable was given on when the exceptional operations powers will start to touch base in Iraq. One US troop died in the operation.
“This is an important capability because it takes advantage of what we’re good at”, Carter added. “And that’s the sensation that we want all of (ISIS) leadership and followers to have”, Carter said.
There have been several raids launched by the US on Islamic State facilities in the past year that have resulted in the acquisition of significant intelligence regarding the militant group’s structure, financing and tactics.
At the time, Carter openly acknowledged that the ground forces had been involved in combat operations and there would be more such raids. Those forces are still preparing to begin operations, but USA officials said the time was right to take the next step.
Carter said Iraq will be a partner in any attacks.
“Let me ask you this: have we now contained ISIL?” In the debate which is taking place in the House of Commons David Cameron set out his case for military action against the “medieval monsters” of Islamic State as MPs prepared to vote on authorising RAF air strikes against the group in Syria.
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Mr Carter said all coalition members must do more, citing gaps along the Turkish-Syrian border that Islamic State uses to smuggle goods and fighters to and from the battlefield.
