WASHINGTON (AFP) -
The
Pentagon will submit proposals to President Barack Obama for
strengthening military support to Iraqi forces in the near future, a top
US military official said Friday.
"We have a series of
recommendations that we will discuss with the president in the coming
weeks to further enable our support for the Iraqi security forces," said
General Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
"(Defense
Secretary Ashton Carter) and I both believe that there will be an
increase in US forces in Iraq in coming weeks, but that decision hasn't
been made," Dunford said Friday during a news conference at the
Pentagon.
The recommendations will include ways that the US can
"enable" Iraqi forces in their efforts to recapture the city of Mosul,
the largest urban center in the Islamic State group's "caliphate," an
operation that's expected to be long and difficult.
Pentagon
officials have previously mentioned their desire to accelerate the
training of Iraqi troops, or to provide logistical support for the Mosul
offensive.
The US military confirmed this week the presence of
some 200 Marines and artillery in northern Iraq, with the artillery used
to support Iraqi troops as they advanced in the region.
"There is
no inconsistency between what this artillery unit did and what our
aviation is doing every single day" in its bombing campaign against IS,
he said.
Officially, there are 3,870 US troops deployed in Iraq.
But the actual number is likely about 5,000, according to media reports
that Dunford did not deny on Friday.
Strengthening US military
presence in Iraq is a sensitive issue for the Obama administration,
which has vowed not to deploy ground forces there.
Shiite militias in Iraq also oppose additional US deployments to their country.
Dunford
and Carter, who was also at the briefing, warned that the battle
against IS will play out outside Iraq and Syria as well.
Efforts
to prevent attacks such as those carried out in Brussels will not
succeed "unless all the countries that are affected by the foreign
fighters are cooperating at the law enforcement, the intelligence
community level and the military level," Dunford said.
Carter added that these were "critical" components in the fight against IS, especially in European countries.
The
United States has repeatedly called on European nations to improve
shortcomings in their intelligence sharing and police cooperation, with
criticism only heightened in the wake of the Belgium attacks this week
that left 31 dead and 300 wounded.
© 2016 AFP
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