MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. – U.S. airstrikes and Iraqi ground forces have blunted an Islamic State offensive in Iraq, but it will be months before Iraq can mount a sustained counteroffensive to take terrain back, a senior U.S. military official said Thursday.
The official, who is involved in directing the military's campaign against the militants, said Iraq's security forces have been able to mount some limited counterattacks with the help of U.S. airstrikes.
The official, who briefed reporters on the situation in Iraq, asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the strategy. The official did not say exactly how long it would take to rebuild Iraq's forces so they could repel the militants, but indicated it would be less than a year.
Four Iraqi divisions collapsed when the Islamic State attacked Mosul in June, allowing militants to grab large swaths of the country.
Since the U.S. began bombing, Iraqi forces have consolidated their defenses around Baghdad, retaken Mosul Dam and halted Islamic State's efforts to expand their reach in some locations.
Launching a broad campaign to retake terrain will require rebuilding Iraq's security forces, the Pentagon has conceded, even though the United States spent billions of dollars arming and training them. That's because since the U.S. withdrawal from Iraq in 2011, the quality of the country's security forces has declined, the Pentagon says.
Reasons the U.S. military cite include former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's appointment of political cronies to top military positions, and reduced training.
Several hundred U.S. advisers are in Iraq working with Iraqi forces at their headquarters but not in field combat.
