Dakota Wood, a former U.S. Marine now with the Heritage Foundation, agreed that the American military advisers bring significant combat experience that will help increase the effectiveness of the Kurdish forces in areas where ISIS is pushing forward. A US-led coalition has been carrying out air strikes against Isis since September 2014.
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“If you don’t adapt the way you execute and implement your strategy, then … unless you can see the future with ideal clarity, you’re setting yourself up for failure”, said State Department spokesman John Kirby, a retired admiral who served previously as spokesman for the Defense Department.
“I think we have a president who just doesn’t know what he’s doing”, Donald Trump, the party’s frontrunner in next year’s race for the White House, told CNN. “There should be a real strategy to take out Isis and to take out Assad”, Bush said, referring to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
One huge risk for the United States in getting closer to or into the action is what IS hopes for: in the course of a few operation, USA troops could fall into IS hands and be brutally exploited on tape for IS revenge.
President Barack Obama’s Friday announcement that special operations forces would be heading to Syria inspired several frustrated lawmakers to call more emphatically for a new authorization of military force (AUMF). “While it is clear that the situation in Syria is deteriorating, I believe that deploying US forces to Syria now is another risky escalation in our involvement, which puts our troops directly in harm’s way”.
While the USA military footprint in the region grows, each step is taken on a small scale so as to reassure the public that Obama isn’t plunging the country into another large, open-ended conflict.
The troops – who are to help US-aligned Kurdish and Arab rebel forces fighting ISIL with logistics and planning – are unlikely to shift the balance of power by themselves due to their small numbers and non-combat role.
“What is important for us is to protect our area, and the security of our children, our homes and our women”, said Sheikh Hmeidi Daham al-Jarba, whose Arab tribal militia, the Sanadeed Forces, has joined the alliance, according to the New York Times.
For the foreseeable future, the new US personnel will not do joint operations with those Syrian groups nor serve as forward air controllers to guide USA and coalition aircraft to targets.
Until now, Obama-a big skeptic of military intervention-had officially balked at putting USA boots on the ground in his effort to battle the Islamic State jihadist group.
While they wouldn’t tell us anything, the Kurdish commanders say the American special forces are a crucial part of their fight against ISIS.
Hasaka province borders Iraq and Islamic State territory there, a crucial stronghold for the group.
Republican Senator Marco Rubio said Islamic State extremists must be confronted.
Bolstering support for Kurdish forces could further irk Turkey, a long-standing ally and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation member that has allowed the U.S. to use Incirlik Airbase as a launching point for strikes against ISIL in Iraq and Syria.
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However, Kerry refused to rule out more USA commandos being sent to Syria.
