Mitt Romney said Sunday he doesn’t want to see U.S. ground troops join the fight against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, but the former Massachusetts governor and 2012 Republican presidential candidate argued that option cannot be ruled out.
Speaking on CBS’ “Face the Nation” program, Mr. Romney criticized his old rival, President Obama, for telling the Islamic State which options are and are not available to the U.S. and its international allies.
“No one wants to call [ground troops] on the table, I don’t think. I just don’t think you take things off the table,” he said. “When the president says, for instance, that [the Islamic State] is a cancer and it must be eliminated, he’s right. But you don’t say, ’Well, we’re only going to use the following tools in doing so.’ You say we’re going to do whatever it takes and hopefully we’ll be able to do that with other people’s troops. But if it takes our own troops, you don’t take that as a source of our strength from the battlefield.”
The White House has repeatedly said American ground forces will not join the campaign against the Islamic State.
Mr. Romney’s comments come on the same day the terrorist group released yet another video showing the beheading a Westerner, this time American aid worker Peter Kassig.
• Ben Wolfgang can be reached at bwolfgang@washingtontimes.com.
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