Obama looks set for long haul in Iraq, despite caution
WITH no set time frame for military engagement and few certainties in Baghdad’s political crisis, US President Barack Obama’s week-old Iraq intervention threatens to monopolise the rest of his presidency.
Two-and-a-half years after he oversaw the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq, Mr Obama has ordered air strikes against a jihadist group but has vowed the US will not be drawn into ground combat. But he has also said, in pledging his support to political transition in Baghdad, that Washington is ready to help Kurdish troops and the as yet unformed new Iraqi government “battle these terrorists”.
“President Obama seems to have adopted a strategy of making a long-term military commitment to Iraq,” wrote Anthony Cordesman, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who suggested it might be the “best option” or the “least bad and filled with risks”.
Some of Mr Obama’s Republican rivals have denounced the approach, judging it imperative to hit harder and faster against the rapid advance of the Sunni jihadists from the so-called Islamic State.
Hawkish senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham argue the US should go beyond humanitarian intervention and should pursue Islamic State fighters without waiting for a political transition in the Iraqi capital.
The White House says it has two goals: protect US personnel stationed in Erbil, the capital of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region, and avert a possible genocide on Mount Sinjar, where refugees from the Yazidi religious minority are sheltering.
On Wednesday, a group of US soldiers deployed to the mountain on a reconnaissance mission concluded there was no need for a large-scale intervention beyond dropping aid and advising the Kurdish forces battling to break the siege.
But, even assuming the Yazidis escape, the defence of Arbil will continue and it appears unlikely Washington could accept Islamic State control of large swathes of territory, leaving Iraq’s government to its fate.
And if the US operation continues, the military’s targets would be expected to evolve. “So far, mostly what we have been doing is very limited strikes against a handful of very vulnerable exposed targets,” says Stephen Biddle of the Council on Foreign Relations, citing Pentagon reports.
Public perception of the US engagement could profoundly change if a US air strike hits “a school or a hospital”, he warned.
Mr Obama has stressed there is “no American military solution” in Iraq, insisting: “The only lasting solution is for Iraqis to come together and form an inclusive government.” He has not hidden his regrets over the aftermath of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation air strikes in Libya in 2011, which helped local rebels overthrow long-time dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
While he argues military action was justified, he has lamented the absence of parallel political efforts.
Libya is again in chaos, with rival militias fighting for control of the capital. The US ambassador and three more Americans were killed on September 11 2012 in an attack on a diplomatic compound in the Libyan city of Benghazi, a worrying omen for a president with one eye on the US consulate in Arbil.