US could consider recommendation for more ground troops to help ISF: Hagel

Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel told CNN in an interview that he would consider recommendations to send ground troops to Iraq from the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.

However, Hagel insisted the troops would not be in a combat role and would only be used to help local Iraqi Security Forces find targets.

“There will be no American combat troops in Iraq or Syria,” Hagel said.

Hagel’s comment is the latest in a series of shifting statements from officials in President Barack Obama’s administration about what role US troops will play in the fight against the terrorists of the ISIL group (also known as ISIS) in Syria and Iraq.

Obama has repeatedly insisted the growing number of American forces sent to Iraq would not have a “combat mission.” At the G20 Summit in Australia, he said Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, “has not advised me that I should be sending U.S. troops to fight,” However, on Thursday, Dempsey, who traveled to Iraq on Saturday to evaluate the situation on the ground, told the House Armed Services Committee he was “certainly considering” using US troops to help retake the city of Mosul from ISIL./End/