US President Barack Obama on Monday announced the biggest expansion of US ground troops in Syria since its civil war began, but the move was unlikely to mollify Arab allies angry over Washington’s cautious approach to the conflict.
The deployment of up to 250 US Army Special Forces soldiers increases US forces in Syria about six-fold and is aimed at helping militia fighters who have clawed back territory from Islamic State militants, formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), in a string of victories.
Defense experts said giving more fighters on the ground access to US close air support could shift the momentum in Syria, but a senior member of the Saudi royal family who asked not to be identified dismissed the decision as “window dressing.”
Photo: AFP
In announcing the deployment, Obama emphasized the importance of sustaining the gains made in the fight against Islamic State, although he said that the US forces would not be spearheading the battle.
“They’re not going to be leading the fight on the ground, but they will be essential in providing the training and assisting local forces as they continue to drive ISIL back,” he said in a speech in Hanover, Germany.
Obama was speaking on the last stop of a foreign tour that also took him to Saudi Arabia and Britain.
Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton and her rival, US Senator Bernie Sanders, on Monday voiced support for the deployment.
The US military has led an air campaign against Islamic State since 2014 in Iraq and Syria, but its effectiveness in Syria has been limited by a lack of allies on the ground in a country where a multi-sided civil war has raged for five years.
A Russian air campaign launched in Syria last year has been more effective because it is closely coordinated with the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who is Moscow’s ally, but a foe of the US.
Rising tensions with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab monarchies, which have privately criticized the Obama administration’s security policy toward the region, have also complicated the US effort in Syria.
US Senator John McCain called the move overdue, but insufficient.
“Another reluctant step down the dangerous road of gradual escalation will not undo the damage in Syria to which this administration has borne passive witness,” said McCain, who leads the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Washington’s main allies on the ground have been a Kurdish force known as the YPG, which wrested control of much of the Turkish-Syrian border from Islamic State. However, the alliance has been constrained because US ally Turkey is deeply hostile to the YPG.
The deployment will include medical and logistics support personnel, officials said, and US support for the US forces in Syria will be staged out of northern Iraq.
Their goal will be to help screen and equip Arab fighters seeking to join up with the majority Kurdish Syrian Democratic Forces.
US officials say Arab fighters will be crucial to future operations against Islamic State in traditionally Arab parts of Syria.
However, Washington would still have to take a political decision to help the Kurds despite Turkish objections. Kurdish advances have largely stopped since February, with Turkey opposed to the Kurds taking more territory.
The Syrian Democratic Forces, a US-backed coalition set up in October to unite the Kurdish YPG and some Arab allies, welcomed Obama’s announcement, but said it still wanted more help.
The HNC umbrella opposition, which represents groups opposed to al-Assad, but not the Kurds, also welcomed US forces helping rid Syria of the Islamic State “scourge,” but said Washington should do more to fight al-Assad.
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