President Obama denied that the U.S. and its allies were losing the fight against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, but he acknowledged in an interview posted Thursday that more should be done to help Iraqis recapture lost territory.
While repeating his refusal to commit large-scale U.S. forces to the region, the president said Sunni fighters in Iraq needed more commitment and training to take on ISIL. But he offered no regrets about his handling of the war and said in the end it would be up to the Iraqis to increase their efforts.
"I don't think we're losing," Obama said in a Tuesday interview with the Atlantic. "There's no doubt there was a tactical setback, although Ramadi had been vulnerable for a very long time, primarily because these are not Iraqi security forces that we have trained or reinforced."
New York Times
