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Anbar province calls for U.S. "Boots" to stop ISIS
ISIS fighters stood Saturday on the verge of taking not just a key Syrian town along the Turkish border, but also an entire province on Baghdad's doorstep -- spurring leaders of that province to urgently plead for U.S. ground troops to halt the Islamist extremist group's rapid, relentless assault.Should all of Anbar fall, the Sunni extremists would rule from the perimeter of Iraq's capital to Raqqa in Syria (at least), according to the provincial council's deputy head, Falleh al-Issawi. To stave off Anbar's collapse, provincial leaders have asked Iraq's central government to intervene immediately and for U.S. ground forces to be deployed there, said al-Issawi. The Iraqi government said it has not received any official request from Anbar province for U.S. military intervention and ground forces to help in the fight against ISIS, Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi's media office said Saturday. The Iraqi government has been adamant that it does not want U.S. forces on the ground, and President Barack Obama has not shown any intent to deploy any. A U.S. defense official said Saturday that Iraq's government hasn't asked for any more American troops beyond those already in Iraq.And if they did, the official added, "The U.S. will not deploy combat ground forces to Iraq. And we remain focused on enabling the (Iraqi military) in the fight against ISIL through our advise/assist efforts and the air campaign." In Iraq, ISIS appears to be targeting cities along the Euphrates River. Al-Karhout said his provincial council has intelligence that ISIS has dispatched as many as 10,000 fighters to Anbar from Syria and Mosul in northern Iraq. The Iraqis' ultimate goal is to take back some of the vast areas, in both Iraq and Syria, that ISIS controls. But right now, Iraqi forces appear to be mostly trying to survive, taking defensive positions and using Apache helicopters again, even after two were shot down in the area this week, according to the U.S. official. Iraqi army forces and Anbar tribesmen fighting alongside them have threatened to abandon their weapons if the U.S. military does not intervene to help them. Some 1,800 tribesmen in the province have been killed or injured in the struggle. Posted by: Pappy 2014-10-13 |
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