(Newswire.net — September 29, 2014) — The US-led campaign against the group also known as ISIS is still in its infancy, but continues to garner support from the international community, said Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey In a press conference from the United States military’s headquarters near Washington, DC on Friday.
In order to succeed, however, an infantry of up to 15,000 fighters may need to be trained to take on the extremists, said Gen. Dempsey.
The US began launching attacks at ISIS strongholds in Syria for the first time this week in addition to targets in Iraq, and Gen. Dempsey said at Friday’s presser that those efforts may have already begun to pay off.
According to the US government, more than 40 nations — including Syria’s Middle East neighbors of Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saud Arabia, Bahrain and Jordan — have so far pledged support to the anti-ISIS campaign.
“No one is under any illusions that airstrikes alone will destroy ISIL,” Defense Secretary Hagel told reporters. “They are one element of our broader, comprehensive campaign against ISISL.”
“Yes, there has to be a ground component to the campaign against ISIL in Syria,” the Joint Chiefs chairman said later during the briefing, adding that earlier figures pertaining to a group of 5,000 prospective US-trained forces may be but a fraction of what is truly required. Instead, he said, upwards of 15,000 combatants may need to be trained in order to take on the ever growing Islamic State.
“This will not be an easy or brief effort,” Hagel said. “We are at the beginning not the end” of the administration’s effort to degrade and destroy the Islamic State.
Hagel and Dempsey’s remarks came two days after US President Barack Obama appealed before an international audience to assist in America’s anti-ISIS campaign during an address at the United Nations headquarters in New York City.
“No God condones this terror,” he said of the group. “No grievance justifies these actions. There can be no reasoning – no negotiation – with this brand of evil. The only language understood by killers like this is the language of force. So the United States of America will work with a broad coalition to dismantle this network of death.” Obama said.
“There has been no coordination, nor will there be, with the Assad regime,” Sec. Hagel said, suggesting the Pentagon will continue to launch strikes in Syria without the permission of that country’s president. “Nothing has changed about our position that has shifted our approach to Assad and his regime because President Assad has lost all legitimacy to govern,” he said.