Who would make up Obama’s ‘ground game’ to fight the Islamic State?

HARI SREENIVASAN:

For more about efforts to defeat the Islamic State, we're joined now from Washington by Anthony Cordesman. He's with the Center for Strategic and International Studies and was the director of intelligence assessment in the office of the secretary of defense.

Mr. Cordesman, the president of the United States has said that we need a ground game, a partial response from the region might be you and what army? So, who are the people who would actually be on the ground and help tackle ISIS?

ANTHONY CORDESMAN:

The Iraqi forces are relatively large compared to any estimate of what the Islamic State's forces are. If you provide the capability and training to make those Iraqi forces more effective, if you give the Kurdish Peshmerga better arms, you really have a force on the ground that's significantly superior to what the Islamic State has.

If you throw into that U.S. air power, or that of some other country supplied not only Iraq but in Syria, you have a divisive amount of fire-power. And if you add to this the ability to seal off the Islamic State on the borders of the areas it occupies to cut off its economic structure and reduce its flow of volunteers – in combination that's a lot of leverage.

It's also a lot of 'if's,' but the problem is not so much the ground game, the problem is to create a structure in Iraq where the Sunnis and Kurds can cooperate with the Shi'ite forces. Where you can rebuild the Iraqi forces without having them take sides in an ethnic, or sectarian civil war.

HARI SREENIVASAN:

Are we confident that the Iraqi security forces can be trained up and not walk off the battlefield like they have in previous occasions?]

ANTHONY CORDESMAN:

Well, we have to be careful, they didn't exactly walk off the battlefield, they fled. And part of it was their leadership is leadership Malaki chose on the basis of loyalty, by sect, and used in ways which abused the local population. Are we confident we can change that?

No, we're not, nobody can be. This is up to the Iraqis and the Iraqi government, but so far there has been enough progress to at least offer hope. And we have seen cooperation between the Kurdish forces and the Shi'ite forces as well as the Iraqi forces. We have seen U.S. advisors help the Iraqi forces, at least try to take back territory in areas like Tikrit.

So, there are some positive signs. There are certainly no guarantees.

HARI SREENIVASAN:

Is there any amount of religious pressure that the leadership in the region can bring to bare on ISIS?

ANTHONY CORDESMAN:

Well, that's a critical question. The answer is not pressure, but the problem is we in the West, whether it's the United States or its European allies, can never make an argument that we're either an Islamic State, or that we're Arabs.

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, can, Turkey can make an argument and it can join in this. So, one of the key issues is to have the clerics in the states that are around the Islamic State. To have them make the case as to just how extreme the Islamic State is, how much it is departed from the real values of Islam.

The ideological dimension here is as critical as the military, or the political, or the economic dimension.

HARI SREENIVASAN:

Would any of those countries in the neighborhood send in ground troops?

ANTHONY CORDESMAN:

I think the answer is, it would be very difficult. It's not clear what would happen if you send in Saudi, or Jordanian forces. And certainly Turkish forces would not be an element that would really contribute to stability.

The problem in Iraq essentially is you need to have Iraqis on the ground. They don't have to be Sunni, but they have to be part of a government that Sunnis can trust, and the same is true of the Kurds.

When it comes down to Syria, the fact is walking into that particular mess we're not simply talking about the Islamic State, or al-Nusra, or the so-called moderate rebels, but you have more than seventy fragmented elements, is not something that can easily be done from the outside.

It's even more difficult for the United States to send in ground troops.

HARI SREENIVASAN:

Alright, Anthony Cordesman joining us from Washington. Thanks so much.

ANTHONY CORDESMAN:

Thank you.