More US troops going to Iraq to conduct raids, fight ISIS

The special operations troops will fight with the Iraqi military and have the capability to launch unilateral strikes into Syria, Carter said at a hearing of the Armed Services Committee of the House of Representatives.

The Iraqi prime minister’s comments came in repsonse to the earlier announcement by the United States Defence Secretary Ashton Carter that the USA will deploy “specialised” troops to Iraq to help fight the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) group.

Mr Carter told lawmakers the U.S. military is “eager” to do more in Syria to fight IS.

According to a US official, the force could total up to a couple hundred troops, including the assault teams, aviation units and other support units. More are on the way.

“Most of their air operations are not directed at ISIL”, Carter said.

On Sunday, Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham called for Washington to almost triple the USA military force levels in Iraq to 10,000, and send an equal number of troops to Syria to “counter” Daesh terrorists. He said that will improve intelligence and generate more targets for attacks. We have the long reach that no-one else has.

“We do not need foreign ground combat forces on Iraqi land”, Haider al-Abbadi said in a statement on Tuesday.

‘These special operators will over time be able to conduct raids, free hostages, gather intelligence, and capture ISIL leaders, ‘ he said.

“It puts everyone on notice in Syria”, Carter said.

There also was a joint raid raid carried out by USA forces and Iraqi peshmerga in October that resulted in the death of a US service member.

Territory under control of the Islamic State group, which is also referred to as ISIL, overlaps the Iraq-Syria border. They both also said that, while the country should center around the government in Baghdad, there must be a level of decentralization so the Sunnis and Kurds each have a degree of self-government.

Now an adjunct fellow at the Hudson Institute, a Washington policy and research group, he said that even if the new US force was successful in eliminating high-value targets, it might not be enough.

The force operations, themselves, will be intelligence driven, the general said.

That would complicate deployment of United States troops on the ground as several Shiite militias – which back the current Baghad government in its fight against IS – have vowed to resist any American troop presence. “And that’s the sensation that we want all of ISIL’s leadership and followers to have”.

DOD officers tell NBC News source in that the USA will seek the advice of with the Iraqi authorities still in that doesn’t preclude unilateral operations in Iraq as well. A US soldier was killed during the operation.

A top official told the BBC that this does not indicate a change in U.S. strategy, but an “intensification” of the military campaign.

Since beginning the air campaign against ISIS in August 2014, President Obama has maintained that he will neither place ground troops in Syria nor Iraq. The US forces will remain in Syria for the foreseeable future.