Only “four or five” U.S.-trained rebels are currently fighting in Syria, or thousands less than the Pentagon expected, the chief of the military campaign against the Islamic State told Congress on Wednesday as President Obama’s war plans came under withering criticism from both Republicans and Democrats.
Army Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III, head of U.S. Central Command, admitted that was less than they’d hoped for, but insisted the overall plans for trying to combat the Islamic State remain solid, even as other top brass has described the situation as a stalemate.
“The New Syrian Force program has gotten off to a slow start,” Gen. Austin told the Senate Armed Services Committee, though he said the fighters were always meant to be a “complement” to the airstrike campaign the U.S. is leading with an international coalition, and to other indigenous forces already fighting.
Gen. Austin and Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Christine E. Wormuth also faced pointed questions about the expanding role Russia is playing in Syria, and whether its commitment of military power to back the Assad regime, which the U.S. opposes, could cause a tangle with American forces.
Syria’s ambassador to the U.N. said Wednesday that Russia should be able to carry out airstrikes within Syria on Islamic State targets, The Associated Press reported. Ambassador Bashar Ja’afari said if the U.S. is claiming the right to strike, Russia should be able to as well.
“After all, we are fighting the same enemy,” he said.
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Ms. Wormuth said the more involved Russia gets, the more necessary it will be to have a “deconfliction mechanism” to make sure U.S. and Russian aircraft aren’t getting in each other’s way. Gen. Austin said the U.S. already does that with Syrian government forces.
But the situation is growing increasingly complicated, and senators on both sides of the aisle questioned whether the Obama administration’s plans are working given the failure of the “train and equip” program.
“Let’s not kid ourselves, that’s a joke,” said Sen. Kelly Ayotte, New Hampshire Republican.
Sen. Claire McCaskill, Missouri Democrat, said even with dozens more fighters in the pipeline, “we’re counting on our fingers and toes at this point, when we’d envisioned 5,400 [fighters] by the end of the year.”
American forces have trained about five dozen fighters already, but some of them were killed or captured by insurgents as soon as they were inserted back into Syria. That’s left just four or five actual fighters still engaged, the general said.
Mr. Obama has said he won’t commit American ground forces to direct combat against the Islamic State, and instead is relying on regional troops. One of those components was to be thousands of rebels, whom the U.S. would vet as not hostile to Western interests, and then train and equip. The goal was to have thousands trained and deployed by the end of this year.
The administration officials said there are more than 100 in the pipeline being trained, but admitted that was still far from their goal. They said the vetting has kept the potential pool of recruits small, and said those that were reinserted needed more support.
Last month the administration authorized airstrikes to aid Syrian rebel fighters — but even that proved to be controversial, with Sen. Tim Kaine, Virginia Democrat, questioning whether the president had legal authority to commit U.S. troops, without any grant of authority from Congress, to defend non-Americans.
Mr. Kaine said he agreed with the move from a tactical standpoint, but “I’ve never seen an interpretation of [the president’s constitutional powers under] Article II that would do this.”
Mr. Kaine and Committee Chairman John McCain, Arizona Republican, pressed the administration to create a no-fly buffer zone in Syria to protect the millions of refugees forced from their homes. But Gen. Austin said he couldn’t recommend that at this point because there aren’t enough ground troops the U.S. can rely on to maintain it.
He said the U.S. has the ability to do it, but “I would not recommend a buffer zone at this point.”
Gen. Austin said the fight against the Islamic State will “take years,” but he and Ms. Wormuth defended Mr. Obama’s overall plan.
“The administration believes we have the right strategy in place. We’re now focused on implementing the strategy as effectively as possible,” Ms. Wormuth said.
During the hearing, Gen. Austin also confirmed an inspector general is investigating his intelligence directorate at Central Command after allegations that the intelligence officers may have shaded reports to provide a more optimistic sense of how the fight against the Islamic State is going.
He said he couldn’t go into details because the matter is under investigation, but said he will “take appropriate actions” once a report is finished.
Gen. Austin did, however, testify that he has never ordered the intelligence to be altered, and said none of the intelligence from his operation goes straight to the White House, but is “funneled” through the Defense Intelligence Agency, which vets it.
Ms. McCaskill said she would be watching to see what the report concludes, and will make sure the whistleblowers who raised concerns are protected from Pentagon retaliation.
“It’s a serious allegation that strikes at the core of our government in terms of our ability to oversee and make decisions around the use of our military,” she said.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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