Obama lauds Congress for Syria plan
US President Barack Obama has hailed Congress for approving his plan to arm and train what he called moderate opposition militants fighting against the Syrian government.
“The strong, bipartisan support in Congress for this new training effort shows the world that Americans are united in confronting the threat,” Obama said at the White House on Wednesday.
Obama’s comments came minutes after the US Senate approved the so-called train-and-equip plan, a day after it was passed by the House of Representatives.
The Pentagon plans to train and arm 5,000 militants in Syria as part of the Obama administration’s long-term strategy to confront ISIL whose militants have seized a third of both Iraq and Syria, and beheaded two US journalists and one British citizen.
Obama had requested $500 million from Congress to train and equip the militants fighting both the government of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and ISIL militants.
On Thursday, he again said that the US will not start another ground war in Iraq or Syria. “As I told our troops yesterday, we can join with allies and partners to destroy ISIL without American troops fighting another ground war in the Middle East.”
On Wednesday, Obama told an audience of American troops that “the American forces that have been deployed to Iraq do not and will not have a combat mission.”
“I will not commit you and the rest of our armed forces to fighting another ground war in Iraq,” he added.
The United States has deployed some 1,600 troops to Iraq to bolster security for American diplomats and provide advice to Iraqi government forces fighting the militants.
The US calls them military advisors, but according to American defense officials, the troops are comprised of Marines and special operations forces from the US Central Command region.
The ISIL terrorists, who were initially trained by the CIA in Jordan in 2012 to destabilize the Syrian government, control large parts of Syria’s northern territory. ISIL sent its fighters into Iraq in June, quickly seizing large swaths of land straddling the border between the two countries.
The US president stated that Washington is assembling “a broad and international coalition” to fight ISIL terrorists in Syria and Iraq.
GJH/GJH