U.S.-trained Iraqi troops to join Ramadi counteroffensive

For the first time, Iraqi troops trained by the U.S.-led coalition have been added to the assault force Iraq is using to retake the city of Ramadi, a U.S. military official said Thursday. The news that about 3,000 U.S.-trained Iraqi army soldiers were added to the fight in recent days was disclosed to Defense Secretary Ash Carter, who spent the day getting updates and meeting with U.S. and Iraqi officials and commanders in Baghdad. The visit comes at an important moment for the Iraqi government just before the counteroffensive on Ramadi. The Ramadi campaign will be a crucial test not only for the Iraqi government led by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, but also for the U.S. strategy of relying on Iraqi security forces, operating in coordination with U.S.-led coalition airstrikes, to overcome the smaller Islamic State forces.

I know that you have suffered great losses too, but I just wanted to tell you that it is very clear to us in Washington what a capable force this is. So, it’s a privilege for us to be your partners.

Defense Secretary Ash Carter to Iraqi soldiers

Meanwhile, Turkish forces returned fire on Islamic State militants in Syria with tank shells on Thursday after a Turkish soldier was killed and two others were wounded in a cross-border firefight, the military said. The fighting comes days after a suspected suicide bombing by the Islamist radical group in a Turkish border town killed 32 people, many of them students and some of them Kurds, touching off waves of violence in the largely Kurdish Southeast. Also on Thursday, Turkey agreed to allow the U.S. military to launch air strikes against Islamic State militants from a U.S. air base in Incirlik.

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