New York // An “enduring victory” over ISIL hinges on local ground forces, but US officials admitted on Wednesday that building an allied force in Syria to take on the extremist group will be difficult without the authorisation to protect them from regime forces.
An overt train-and-equip programme to build up a new force of 15,000 vetted moderate rebels over three years is set to begin imminently, but “we’re not going to be able to recruit men into that force unless we are able to support them at some level” from Syrian army aerial attacks, General Martin Dempsey, the top US military officer said.
The various agencies of the Obama administration are in discussions about how they might be able to protect the future Washington-backed Syrian force, but “the legal aspect of that has not been determined”, US defence secretary Ash Carter told the Senate foreign relations committee.
The Pentagon chief was speaking at a hearing to discuss legislation that has been submitted to the US congress by the White House, authorising the use of military force against ISIL. Gen Dempsey and US secretary of state John Kerry also testified at the hearing.
Under this new war authorisation, direct US military action against Syrian president Bashar Al Assad’s forces will not be legally allowed.
“This [authorisation] is ISIL specific,” Mr Kerry said. “There are those who wish it would include Assad, but it doesn’t.”
He added that once the US-backed Syrian force has defeated ISIL, “in the course of that fight they will be strengthened in their other activities”.
Critics, including Washington’s regional allies, say there is a Syrian blind spot in the US strategy to degrade and defeat ISIL, and that finding men among the increasingly radicalised Syrian rebels who are willing to back the US without any protection from regime assaults is unlikely. Mr Al Assad himself, in a recent interview with Foreign Affairs magazine, said he would continue to target such a US-backed force.
Legislators from both parties have called on president Barack Obama to pass a new war authorisation against ISIL. The administration submitted a draft last month that seeks to balance Republican demands for broad flexibility in taking on the group, with Democratic fears that the fight will lead to an open-ended conflict.
The administration says it is already on solid legal footing – relying on an authorisation for force passed in the wake of the September 11 attacks – but wants congress to support the new law in order to “dispel any doubt anywhere that Americans are united in this effort”, Mr Kerry said.
“Your unity would also send an unmistakable message to the leaders of Daesh,” he added, referring to ISIL by its Arabic acronym. “They have to understand they can’t divide us. Don’t let them.”
ISIL has faced a number of military setbacks in Iraq and Syria over the past week, and signs are emerging that the combined impact of the ground and air campaigns against them are causing internal fissures within the group. Mr Kerry called it a “pivotal hour”.
The draft war authorisation would last for three years and prohibit “enduring offensive ground combat operations”, without defining the phrase, by US troops.
“[The law] wisely does not include any geographical restriction because ISIL already shows signs of metastasising outside of Syria and Iraq,” Mr Carter said. He added that this “could apply to operations in and around Libya”.
The hearing came as acrimony reached new heights in Washington over the administration’s talks with Tehran over its nuclear programme. Following last Tuesday’s controversial address to congress by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, 47 Republican senators and a governor signed an open letter to the Iranian leadership, saying they would scuttle any deal signed by Mr Obama.
Mr Kerry, who is also chief US negotiator in the talks, said he was in “utter disbelief” when he saw the letter, and that it was legally incorrect – that congress would not be able to undo any accord that is signed.
By Wednesday, more than 155,000 people had signed a petition to the White House urging charges to be filed against the Republican senators who sent the letter, saying the politicians had committed “treasonous” offences.
The petition states that the senators “violate[d] the Logan Act, a 1799 law that forbids unauthorised citizens from negotiating with foreign governments.”
The White House has said it responds to such petitions when they reach the 100,000-signature threshold, providing president Barack Obama’s administration with another opportunity to slam a letter that it considers inflammatory.
Wednesday’s hearing veered into the Iran debate a number of times, with potential Republican presidential candidate, senator Marco Rubio, accusing the administration of not doing more to help rebels in Syria out of fear of jeopardising the talks.
“There’s no consideration whatsoever” of what Iran wants in the fight against ISIL, Mr Kerry said, adding that there is also no “grand bargain” being sought with Iran that would allow it to pursue even greater influence in the region.
The hearing came the same day Iran’s top general, Major General Mohammad Ali Jafari, said his country had reached “a new chapter” in its goal of exporting its Islamic revolution, a euphemism for Iran’s strategy for regional influence, according to the student-run ISNA news agency.
Several senators questioned the officials over fears that Iranian-backed Shiite militias were taking control of the ground war against ISIL in Iraq, which they said could undermine the political reconciliation process that is key to the extremist group’s defeat.
Gen Dempsey said that “anything anyone does counter to ISIL is in the main a good outcome”, but that the US-led coalition is “concerned about what happens after the drums stop beating and ISIL is defeated”.
He added that the current offensive to retake the city of Tikrit in Sunni-majority Anbar province, led by around 20,000 Shiite militiamen, is “an inflection point” in judging the militias’ intentions. Only about 1,000 Sunni tribal fighters are taking part in the operation.
The Popular Mobilisation Forces, as the militias are called, have been accused of summary executions of civilians, forced displacement and other atrocities in Sunni villages in Diyala province that they have cleared.
“What we are watching carefully is whether the militias … when they recapture lost territory, whether they engage in acts of retribution and ethnic cleansing,” Gen Dempsey said. “There’s no indication that that is a widespread event at this point, but we’re watching closely.”
tkhan@thenational.ae
* With additional reporting by Agence France-Presse
