Syrian and other Arab ground forces must be found to take on Islamic State, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Thursday, warning the militant group would not be defeated by air strikes alone.
Kerry was speaking hours after Britain launched bombing raids against Islamic State targets in Syria, joining forces with France and the United States nearly three weeks after the jihadist group killed 130 people in attacks across Paris.
British Prime Minister David Cameron says there are as many as 70,000 moderate opposition fighters in Syria ready to take on Islamic State with the help of foreign air strikes, an assertion opponents of the bombing campaign have questioned.
“I think we know that without the ability to find some ground forces that are prepared to take on Daesh, this will not be won completely from the air,” Kerry said, using an Arabic term for the jihadist group.
Asked later if he meant Western ground forces, Kerry said after a meeting in Belgrade of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE): “(I’m) talking about Syrian and Arab, as we have been consistently.”
A U.S. official traveling with Kerry said the secretary of state was speaking mainly of Syrian ground forces, but that it was conceivable troops of other Arab nations could be involved.
