Barack Obama doesn’t want to do the only thing that could actually destroy the Islamic State: send combat troops back to Iraq. To do that would be to admit the failure of his Iraq policies since the beginning of his Administration. And even if he did send troops, he would probably hamstring them, as in Afghanistan, with impossible Rules of Engagement, such that they wouldn’t destroy the Islamic State anyway, and the jihad would resume at full force as soon as the Americans were gone again.
“Obama to send approximately 350 additional military personnel to Iraq,” FoxNews.com, September 2, 2014 (thanks to Kenneth):
President Obama announced Tuesday he is sending approximately 350 additional military personnel to Iraq to protect U.S. diplomatic facilities and workers in Baghdad.
The White House said in a press release that the personnel will not serve a combat role, and are fulfilling a request from the State Department for more protection as the country fights an insurgency from the Islamic State militant group, also known as ISIS or ISIL.
The White House said the additional personnel will be able to provide a “more robust, sustainable security force” and will allow previously deployed personnel to leave the country.
Additionally, the White House said the U.S. is continuing to support the Iraqi government against the terror group, which it says “poses a threat not only to Iraq, but to the broader Middle East and U.S. personnel and interests in the region.”
“The president will be consulting this week with NATO allies regarding additional actions to take against ISIL and to develop a broad-based international coalition to implement a comprehensive strategy to protect our people and to support our partners in the fight against ISIL,” the release stated.
As of August 13, there were approximately 1,000 U.S. military personnel in Iraq working to combat the threat from the Islamic State. According to the Associated Press, the personnel mainly consisted of security forces and assessment and advising personnel….
Beagle says
A sufficiently robust air campaign, much larger than what we see now, could seriously degrade the IS. Kurds and Shia would happily roll back the IS in the South and North of Iraq. But in the western Sunni areas of Iraq where the IS has majority support, it’s probably time to redraw the maps.
If western non-Muslim historians are allowed to publish in the future they will look back at this time as the last great chance to use overwhelming force and sensible immigration restrictions to avoid the decades of horror which seem certain to follow. But I would not bet on such historians existing in great numbers unless the West rediscovers its martial leadership, willing to do what it takes to defeat barbarism.
Nice behavior in war has been tried for decades, even drinking tea and taking casualties to make friends. Unrestricted Muslim immigration has been tried. Wishful deception about the core nature of Islam has been tried. All have failed miserably.
When Musharraf was questioned about why he cooperated with GWB to the extent he did, he said “they told me the US would bomb us to the Stone Age.” He looked relieved. The credible (?) threat gave him an honor-saving way to cooperate.
Less nice, more bombing to the Stone Age.
John C. Barile says
I think that the Sunni tribes in Anbar and their kin in Syria would rise against IS if they could–but not without determined aid and encouragement from regional and world powers.
kikorikid says
“Non-Combatants”? Three-hundred fifty future “Hostages”.
David, Thailand says
Three-hundred fifty future “Hostages”.
——————–
That’s Obama’s cunning two-pronged plan, to put on a caring face whilst he empties Gitmo to ‘save American lives’.
gravenimage says
John C. Barile wrote:
I think that the Sunni tribes in Anbar and their kin in Syria would rise against IS if they could–but not without determined aid and encouragement from regional and world powers.
……………………………
Well, yeah, John—but Sunnis in Anbar don’t actually oppose the *Ideals* of ISIS—they just don’t want anyone else running the Caliphate.
We have to recall that Anbar is home to some of the most fervent Sunni Jihadists.
If we *did* aid Anbar Jihadists against ISIS as an expedient measure, we would have to bear in mind that they are not real allies of ours.
“Governor of Iraq’s Anbar province calls on U.S. to help against ISIS”
http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2014/08/14/Governor-of-Iraq-Sunni-heartland-says-U-S-to-help-against-ISIS.html
sujith says
Sending troops on ground would be disastrous idea especially when u have a fantasy based Muslim President of USA.
Sell arms to Iraqis , train them and offer air support . And send the Bill to Iraqis.
Why blow up tax payers money to fight the battle in Iraq ?
why should American soldiers come back with life time injuries
that the VA cannot be bothered to attend to ?
Don’t Iraqis have cash to fund & fight it themselves ? Fact : Iraq earns $100 Billion annual income from oil export …do they give free or discounted oil to America ?
And get troops out of afganistan — the fantasy based war on terror is waste of human life and drain on tax payers money
Beagle says
If you think this is an Iraq and Syria problem, you really, really… really don’t get it.
The IS recruits from Sunni Islam, or 80% of over a billion Muslims According to recent polls it has 92% support in Saudi Arabia and 15% percent in France. Western nations have sent thousands of jihadis to the battlefields in the Middle East. As IS grows stronger it’s attraction and legitimacy will grow with it. Restoration of the caliphate is a central part of modern political Islam and was the main catalyst for the formation of the Muslim Brotherhood.
We’re not fighting terrorist groups now. Now we’re fighting a jihadist nation which can spawn countless terrorist groups everywhere there are like minded people, which is virtually everywhere, period.
sujith says
I’ve know all of what you said above.
That still dies not change what I said .
Support , arm and train Iraqis , kurds to fight this out.
Its already showing some results on the ground.
Let other islamic countries who are at risk fund it for a change ………instead of them using their free cash to fund mosques and spread the same rotten cult all over the non muslim world.
Muslim world using their cash to fight / fund their battles leaves them with less money to fund spread of islam.
US should focus on jihadis within its borders
Mayja says
Exactly how does sending non combat personnel signal the end of ISIS? Please resign before more people get killed! The EU doesn’t even deal with jihadists. Like Europe will help.
gravenimage says
Mayja wrote:
Exactly how does sending non combat personnel signal the end of ISIS? Please resign before more people get killed!
……………………………
Mayja, do you not recognize sarcasm when you see it? Robert Spencer was “not” being serious here.
Tim says
Worried about hamstringing our troops! Ha! The government has been doing that since at least Vietnam. I know they are doing it now in A-Stan. Sending troops and not letting them fight would be tragic. If we send troops then let’s go to all out war and settle it. Annihilation is the only thing these animals understand. If they want to die then let it happen.
Uri says
The Shia continue to resist nonpartisan government and American initiatives for an inclusive state. Assholes, all of them.
Oh, but let’s hurry up and go die for them.
Beagle says
Obama’s sending 350 ‘non-combat’ troops (what the hell does that even mean?) is far more likely to get some killed, or worse captured, than using massive overwhelming air power and combat power on the ground. Obama is using the Vietnam escalating involvement without a strategic plan playbook page by page.
Salah says
“..to develop a broad-based international coalition to implement a comprehensive strategy to protect our people and to support our partners in the fight against ISIL,”
The fight against ISIL? who are you kidding? You created ISIL, you and your Muslim Brotherhood masters running the W.H.
cliffface says
The opportunity was lost when convoys of US supplied military hardware were not returned to ashes and dust by anonymous jets.
Although some Sunni’s were complicit in isis advances many themselves are now victims and in the future will face retribution for isis actions from the other factions .
No surrounding countries can really get involved without opening themselves to in house attacks.
There is no point sending foreign troops as they are viewed as the enemy by all sides even the Kurds would only trust the US so far.
Even though Obama bowing to a dictator and being related to a radical Wahhabi training organisation along with a trail of suspicious policies paints him as complicit in assisting radical Islam.
He is still between a rock and a hard place.
Bomb to much and you will have many innocent victims don’t bomb enough and you will have many innocent victims.
Commit ground troops and you will enter a war between the sunni-shiite-kurds that was always going to happen sooner or later.
From Africa to Iran this war belongs to Islam and it won’t end until the Muslims sort out there differences.
In the meantime split Ukraine in two because if you don’t there will be nothing left to fight for.
Russia does not trust the EU or the US and will not back down and from an outsiders point of view who can blame them.
PRCS says
cliffface wrote:
“complicit in assisting radical Islam.”
Radical Islam?
Don’t you mean Orthodox Islam, as it’s written?
Tommy Guns says
Mr. Obama, and your NATO allies, there’s no rush. If you can squeeze it in this week or next, do you think you can make time to discuss the situation in Iraq??That would be swell. Hope I’m not coming across as pushy.
Champ says
Correction obama: that’s *unholy* quran …and don’t you forget it.
Mike says
Why not recognize the Islamic state and encourage all Muslims residing in the Dar al-Harb they so despise to migrate there. Then revoke their passports. This would overcome the possibility of “statelessness” that is so worrying Western academics and legal rights advocates.
pumbar says
Why didn’t he send the CAIR bears and Nathan lean?
duh_swami says
ISIS can be degraded from the air. Wreck the roads they use, and blow up every gas station and pumping facility in the area.
Proceed from there.
gravenimage says
Islamic State’s end nears: Obama sends 350 non-combat personnel to Iraq
……………………….
Yeah—that’ll learn ’em…sarc/off
dumbledoresarmy says
There’s only *one* military intervention by the West that I would support.
An “Operation Stanley”.
To rescue *all* the remaining Iraqi Christians – the indigenous Assyrians and Chaldeans, the last living link with the pre-Islamic and pre-Arab culture and history of Iraq.
Why “Stanley”? To honour Australian WWI army captain Stanley Savige who, whilst engaged in the eastern theatre within what were then Ottoman domains in 1917, came upon a frantic group of some thousands of desperate, unarmed, defenceless Assyrian Christians who were being pursued and harried – with genocidal intent – by a lot of murderous Mohammedthugs. On his own initiative, Stanley and his small, mobile force – who were substantially outnumbered by the aforesaid mohammedthugs – placed themselves at the rear of the refugee column, and did all they could to draw enemy fire whilst shepherding the refugees toward safety. They fought this “running battle” for some time; and young Captain Savige did indeed enable his Assyrian flock, to which he had appointed himself sheepdog, to escape. Some of their descendants, I think, live in Australia today; and they have never forgotten. They recently paid for and placed a monument on his grave (he survived WWI and died in a good old age, having founded the Australian charity “legacy” which cares for veterans and for the widows and dependents of the fallen).
So, here it is, the thing we should be plugging to our assorted non-Muslim governments, if they are talking about military intervention in Iraq. A strictly limited in time and space and narrowly focused (but massively well equipped “Operation Stanley”. To find and gather up all the remaining Iraqi Christians, – who will otherwise, I am sure, be murdered down to the last man, woman and child – and bring them out to the relative safety of the west. Once the last plane full of Assyrian and Chaldean Christians – and maybe a few tin trunks full of priceless ancient manuscripts and a batch or two of historic icons – lifts off from the runway with its military escorts riding herd, then the “sheepdogs” pack up and leave, too.
Time for us dar al harbis to show some unashamed solidarity with our fellow non-Muslims who are trapped and perishing there in the bottom of the Predator Pit. Let’s do for the Assyrian and Chaldean Christians, in the 21st century, what we were mostly too cowardly and foolish to do for the Armenian Christians – and Greeks, and Assyrians then also – in the 20th (with honorable and isolated exceptions, such as the aforesaid Stanley Savige…or the French naval officer who rescued a bunch of besieged Armenian Christians, as recounted in “The Forty Days of Musa Dargh”). Let’s think about what Israel did for the Jews of Yemen, and for the Jews of …Iraq. We could do it.
I could support *that* kind of intervention. It would lift morale of our troops, too, to be helping people who a/ desperately need help and are b/ actually *grateful* to be helped, and won’t spin round on a dime and stab you in the back or try to slit your throat.