Posted on 03/03/2015 4:04:04 PM PST by keat
Iran's direct support for an Iraqi push to dislodge the Islamic State group from the northern city of Tikrit could turn out to be "a positive thing" if it does not inflame sectarian tensions, the top U.S. general said Tuesday.
The statement by Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, reflected the delicate balance Washington is trying to strike between limiting Iranian influence and allowing Iraqi leaders to determine their own path to defeating the Islamic State.
U.S. officials have said Iraq did not ask the U.S. to provide air support for the Tikrit offensive, even though the U.S.-led military coalition has been conducting airstrikes in much of Iraq since August and has deployed hundreds of U.S. soldiers to try to regenerate an Iraqi army that collapsed last June.
Dempsey said Iran and its proxies have been operating inside Iraq since 2004, but the Tikrit campaign signals a new level of involvement.
"This is the most overt conduct of Iranian support, in the form of artillery and other things," Dempsey said in response to questions from members of the Senate Armed Services Committee. "Frankly, it will only be a problem if it results in sectarianism."
He said that about two-thirds of the force seeking to retake Tikrit is comprised of Iranian-based Shiite militia fighters. Iraqi government troops make up the other third. Tikrit, the hometown of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, is a predominantly Sunni city.
"If they perform in a credible way" and rid Tikrit of Islamic State control, "then it will, in the main, have been a positive thing in terms of the counter-ISIL campaign," Dempsey said.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
I hate to disagree with the good general, but anything the Iranians have a hand in will ultimately turn to crap for everybody except the Iranians.
I remember a woman in Iraq speaking to media just after we got there...
"War...what is war....we've been at war for 30 years."
She then quickly covered her face as if to hide her identity and was lost in the crowd.
Good God.
Putting out fire with gasoline, what could posibally go wrong?
Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of MULLAHS
General Dumpster....a patriot would have resigned and spilled what he knew by now.
Personally I think the only eventual option is a Kurdish state in Northern Iraq and Syria. Nobody there will be happy about it.
He holds on to his job by parroting the Regime line - allegience to reality is not an option.....
No, we should give them the benefit of the doubt. After all, they’ve been right on everything else in the Mideast so far.
My position is that Dempsey is now a mouthpiece for Obama and Valerie.
He seems to be quacking like a liberal duck.
After Team BO eviscerated the military in the first four or five years, everyone left was either a leftist or a career climbing lackey.
Sorry, but that is my opinion.
If? Shiite Persians killing Sunni Arabs? How could it not?
Now if you ask me, sectarian slaughter is the only positive thing that might come from it. The alternative is an Iranian puppet state.
“My position is that Dempsey is now a mouthpiece for Obama and Valerie.
He seems to be quacking like a liberal duck....”
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I’ve noticed that also. Dempsey has clearly become one of the Obama regime’s “willing executioners” as he carries out Obama’s diktats to the American military.
Jack Dempsey was a great boxer. This JCS Dempsey has been hit in the head once too many times. He is the worst JCS chief in American history except for maybe whoever the idiot was under Jimmy Carter’s ruin, er, reign.
What is really going to happen is that Iran now has unrestricted permission to pursue ISIS wherever they might be, and by that permission the will install Iranian troops everywhere due to the fact that ISIS is everywhere in the Mid East.
So Iran will under that guise take over the entire Middle East.
We are fools.
And “the good general” is appointed by the president and is his Charlie McCarthy on obummer’s knee.
GOOD General???? Are you kidding??? He’s an IMBECILE in this!!
Growing Concern in Washington Over Iranian Military’s Growing Power And Influence in Iraq
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3263843/posts
Sectarian mass murder might reduce the number of muslims by a few million.
When I used the expression “good general” is was as a snide, tongue in cheek reference. I’m sure you have used a similar expression or a variation thereof. I guess I should have put it in quotes, my bad.
One of the reasons I dislike texting and IM, there is no way to easily show the smirk on your face when saying something like this and the /s didn’t fit in anywhere.
Believe me when I say that the “good general” is just a kowtowing lackey for the Prez.
Thank God....I thought you were serious.
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