Defense Secretary Carter: Iraqis lack ‘will to fight’ to defeat Islamic State

By Greg Jaffe and Loveday Morris

Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter warned that Iraqi troops will not be able to defeat the Islamic State until they develop a “will to fight,” reflecting the deep level of concern and frustration inside some quarters of the Obama administration in the wake of the Iraqi military’s collapse in Ramadi last week.

His comments, in an interview that aired Sunday, came after fighters with the Islamic State, which had appeared to be retreating in parts of Iraq, swept through the western Iraqi city of Ramadi and were gaining ground in Syria.

President Obama has described the losses as a “tactical setback” and said that the administration’s overall strategy in Iraq and Syria would not change. Carter’s comments, though, suggested deeper problems with Iraqi forces. His remarks about the recent Iraqi defeats in Ramadi, a city where scores of U.S. troops were killed during the Iraq war, carried added gravity because they came over the Memorial Day weekend.

“What apparently happened was that the Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight,” Carter said in an interview that aired Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “They were not outnumbered, but in fact, they vastly outnumbered the opposing force. And yet they failed to fight.”

“What apparently happened was that the Iraqi forces just showed no will to fight,” Carter said in an interview that aired Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “They were not outnumbered, but in fact, they vastly outnumbered the opposing force. And yet they failed to fight.”

Obama administration officials have suggested that more U.S. airstrikes would not necessarily change the performance of Iraqi troops on the ground. “Airstrikes are effective, but neither they nor really anything we do can substitute for the Iraqi forces’ will to fight. They’re the ones who have to beat ISIL and keep them beaten,” Carter said, using a common acronym for the Islamic State. In particular, Carter said that the Sunni tribes in western Iraq, whose populations were initially welcoming of the Islamic State, must do more.

Iraqi politicians hit back at Carter’s claims Sunday, and fighters who fled Ramadi said that more U.S. airstrikes would have enabled them to keep control of the city.

“What the Americans are saying is delusional and not true. They want to make the Iraqi army look weak as a justification to invade Iraq again,” said Hakim al-Zamili, head of the Iraqi parliament’s defense and security committee and a Shiite militia commander. “Yes, there was a setback in Ramadi, but it was only a setback.”

Iraqi forces have been fighting pitched battles in Ramadi since early last year, when Islamic State fighters briefly seized the city and also took control of Fallujah, 30 miles east.

Forces from Iraq’s Golden Division were among those that capitulated in the face of the multi-pronged attack last week, but their commanders had complained that they were severely overstretched by fights on several fronts.

The Obama administration said recently that it is rushing as many as 2,000 shoulder-fired antitank weapons to Iraqi units. They are also pushing the Iraqi government, which has been reluctant to ship arms to Sunni tribal fighters, to speed up the weapons shipments. Recently, U.S. officials said that they had negotiated a new deal with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to streamline the shipment of weapons to tribal fighters who have said they are not getting support from Baghdad.

Omar Shehan al-Alwani, a tribal fighter, said he bought bullets with his own money.

“The Iraqi government didn’t do anything to help us,” he said. “If only the coalition had carried out more. We withstood all this time thanks to our personal efforts.”

Fighters said they were prepared to continue battling but described a breakdown in the chain of command and a lack of coordination among different parts of the security forces.

“The reason for the fall of the city was the security commanders,” said Maj. Omar Khamis al-Dahl, a police officer from Ramadi. “They are not organized. They don’t know how to coordinate with each other.”

More U.S.-led airstrikes would have made a significant difference, he said.

“The coalition had a few strikes, and they were very accurate and helped us a lot,” he said. “But we’d ask for more strikes, and nothing would happen. There were many times that the coalition was in the sky, but they didn’t do anything. . . . If there were 20 airstrikes a day, none of this would have happened.”