WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The US military has drawn up plans to significantly increase the number of American forces in Iraq, which now total around 1,400, as Washington seeks to bolster Iraqi forces battling the Islamic State, US officials told Reuters on Friday.
The US aims to help advise and train Iraqi and Kurdish forces battling Islamic State fighters who swept into much of northern Iraq.
According to a statement from the Pentagon, "The commander-in-chief has authorized Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel to deploy to Iraq up to 1,500 additional US personnel over the coming months, in a non-combat role, to expand our advise and assist mission and initiate a comprehensive training effort for Iraqi forces."
This deployment will "accommodate the training of 12 Iraqi brigades," including nine from the Iraqi Army and three from the Kurdish Peshmerga, the paramilitary of Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government.
The decision was made "based on the request of the Government of Iraq, US Central Command's assessment of Iraqi units," and "the progress Iraqi security forces have made in the field."
This doubling of the US' ground presence in Iraq would come at a time when the American-led coalition in the country has made ambiguous progress in the fight against ISIS. Heavy aerial bombardment against ISIS positions outside of Kobane have managed to prevent the group from taking over the fiercely contested town, which sits on the Turkish-Syrian border.
Here are the latest positions of US airstrikes against ISIS, according to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies' Military Edge project:
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But ISIS is consolidating its gains in the heavily Sunni Anbar Province of western Iraq, where it has carried out massacres against the Albu Nimr, a Sunni tribe whose militia had been fighting against jihadists in the region since 2004. And last month, Obama reportedly sent a letter to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, suggesting that cooperation against ISIS could help smooth the way to an eventual nuclear deal.
(Reporting by Phil Stewart; Editing by Bill Trott)
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