WASHINGOTN- President Barack Obama unveiled Friday plans to send 1,500 additional troops to Iraq to help Baghdad government forces strike back at Islamic State jihadists, roughly doubling the number of US soldiers in the country.
The move extends the US training and advising mission to new areas as Iraqi and Kurdish forces prime themselves to recapture ground lost to the IS group, including in the volatile Anbar province in the west -- where the Iraqi army has been on the retreat against the militants.
The reinforcements were "part of our strategy for strengthening partners on the ground" but would have a "non-combat role," the White House said in a statement.
The United States is already carrying out air strikes against the IS group in Iraq and Syria but officials insisted the decision did not signal "mission creep" towards another all-out ground war.
"They will not be introduced into combat," a senior administration official told reporters.
The US forces will be carrying out the same mission that has been outlined from the start -- to help the Iraqi forces on the ground, backed up by coalition warplanes in the air, the official said.
"The mission is not changing at all for our service members," the administration official said. "We are adding personnel to better carry out the mission."
The 1,500 troops will include advisors to help Iraqi forces plan operations and a group of trainers who will be deployed across the country, as Washington steps up the pressure on IS militants who have grabbed large areas of Iraq and Syria in a brutal campaign.
"What these numbers really allow us to do is to have greater reach into different parts of the country to carry out the train and assist mission," the official said.
To funding the growing war effort, Obama also planned to request $5.6 billion from Congress, including $1.6 billion to train and arm the Iraqi forces, officials said.
The additional troops would not deploy until Congress approved the funding.
The White House presented the troop plan only days after Obama's fellow Democrats suffered a sweeping defeat in midterm elections with Republicans gaining full control of Congress.
Republican Buck McKeon, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, responded to Obama's funding request by voicing doubts that the president was doing enough to counter the IS group and other extremists.
"I remain concerned that the president's strategy to defeat ISIL (IS) is insufficient," McKeon said.
Obama opted to send more troops after discussions with commanders and aides over the last several weeks, officials said.
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel recommended the reinforcements based on a request from the Iraqi government and advice from the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, and the head of US Central Command, General Lloyd Austin, who is overseeing the air war against the IS militants, the Pentagon said.
Officials said they were hopeful that a new Iraqi defense minister would reinvigorate the army, which virtually collapsed earlier this year against the onslaught of the IS group.
The US training will focus on 12 Iraqi brigades -- nine army and three Peshmerga brigades, with training sites located in northern, western, and southern Iraq.
Other countries in the anti-IS coalition would also send troops to help train and advise the Iraqi forces, possibly as many as 700, officials said.
There are now about 1,400 American troops in Iraq, including 600 advisors in Baghdad and Arbil, and 800 troops providing security for the US embassy in the capital and the Baghdad airport.
Obama had previously authorized up to 1,600 troops in Iraq and his decision Friday will raise the maximum troop footprint to 3,100.
US officials would not rule out sending more troops beyond those announced on Friday, but said the prohibition against combat would remain in place.
The US president had resisted keeping troops in Iraq earlier in his term, vowing to end the American presence that began with the 2003 invasion and continued as an occupation through 2011.
Officials had weighed keeping several thousand troops in Iraq after 2011, but talks with the Iraqi government, then led by prime minister Nuri al-Maliki, broke down over the issue of legal immunity, which Washington insisted on and Baghdad declined to provide. (AFP)