WASHINGTON — In the wake of the Paris terrorist attacks, the Republican chairmen of the US House and Senate armed services committees on Tuesday hammered the White House over its counter-Islamic State strategy.
The HASC chair, Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, said the military campaign against the Islamic State group needs a dedicated four-star commander in Iraq, while the SASC chair, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said the US needs to provide 10,000 ground troops to the fight.
"The Paris attacks should be a wake-up call for all Americans and the president," McCain said in a Senate floor speech that quoted Winston Churchill. "If we don't change our strategy now we will be attacked. I don't know when, where or why — but it will happen."
Republican lawmakers, who have repeatedly accused President Obama of waging operations against the Islamic State group without a working strategy, renewed their barrage on Tuesday. They have also criticized Obama for saying hours before the Paris attacks Friday that the Islamic State had been "contained."
"The president is absolutely wrong, his strategy is not working and something more significant needs to take place," Thornberry told reporters.
The administration and National Security Council are "micromanaging" when and where US forces can strike Islamic State targets in Iraq and Syria, Thornberry said. He called for a local commander who can run the campaign and reassure allies of the US commitment to the fight.
The position, in Thornberry's view, currently does not have "sufficient stature" to run the campaign. Army Lt. Gen. Sean McFarland, tapped in September to command Combined Joint Task Force — Operation Inherent Resolve, also leads both III Armored Corps and Fort Hood, Texas.
"We need the military to be in charge of the military campaign in Iraq and Syria, there locally to run the campaign," Thornberry said, adding later: "We need someone with sufficient stature focused on this mission, otherwise you're running out the clock, which is my impression of the White House proposal."
Asked whether the recent deployment of 50 US special operators to the fight was appropriate, Thornberry demurred, saying Congress must avoid micromanaging troop levels or picking targets. "The military needs to say if this is our mission, this is what we need to accomplish that mission," he said.
The White House has rejected options presented by US commanders to step up the fight against the Islamic State group, Thornberry said, though he declined to provide specifics. "I better not," Thornberry said, "but I do believe the military has been trying to give the president some options, and he's not doing it."
The comments came days after House Majority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., asked the chairmen of the House Intelligence, Foreign Affairs, Judiciary, Homeland Security and Appropriations committees to coordinate on short-term and long-term responses to the Islamic State group and terrorism, according to Thornberry.
The administration has deployed 3,500 troops to Iraq to train and assist forces there and has conducted more than 7,000 air strikes on Islamic State targets in Iraq and Syria. In congressional testimony last month, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said the military's strategy is focusing on confronting the Islamic State group in Raqqa, Syria, its de facto capital, retaking Ramadi from militants in western Iraq, and raids such as the one that freed 70 hostages in Iraq last week.
Obama, who has pursued a proxy and air war over ground troop deployments, said Monday that the terrorist attacks in Paris would be met with an "intensification." On the same day, US-led coalition warplanes had pounded the Islamic State group in Syria after the Paris attacks, with French raids hitting Raqqa and another strike destroying dozens of oil tankers.
On the Senate floor later in the day, McCain claimed the president was ignoring a raft of criticism from national security leaders and pursuing a failing strategy. McCain called for an intensified air campaign to establish a no-fly zone above a sanctuary for refugees and a ground force made up of Sunni Arabs, Egyptians and roughly 10,000 Americans.
Sooner action by the administration, McCain said, could have averted the refugee crisis.
"It's not too late; we have to take up arms and tell the American people what’s at stake here," McCain said. "We have to tell take the American people what happened in Paris can happen here."
On the opposite side of the aisle, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., ornia, ranking member on the Senate Intelligence Committee, told CBS News: "I don't see the strategy working."
"[The Islamic State group] is expanding. It's not contained. It's in more than a dozen countries now," Feinstein said.
Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said Congress must vote on whether to grant the president authorization to use military force against the Islamic State group. Over the last 16 months, the US has spent $5 billion on the fight, he said.
"The question is how long will Congress continue to be silent on this," Kaine said in a Senate floor speech. "Congress seems to prefer a strategy of criticizing what the president's doing, and look, I'm critical of some of the things that the president's doing.
"It's not enough for this body, which has a constitutional authority in matters of war, to just criticize the commander in chief. ... We are not fans, we are the owners of the team."
"Congress has seemed to prefer a strategy of criticize what the president is doing … but it's not enough for this body which has a constitutional responsibility to just be a critics … We are not fans, we are the owners of the team."
Kaine, with Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., introduced a resolution in January aimed at a getting a vote on the authorization. Flake, too, spoke on the issue Tuesday, saying the United States' allies "need to know if we are all in or if there are certain limitations on the use of force. … If there aren’t, we need to let our adversaries know as well."
Lawmakers have said the prospects are dim for an authorization measure. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Sen. Bob Corker told Politico last week the administration's position is that it does not need new powers to battle the Islamic State group — and Corker has no appetite for a partisan fight over it.
"To bring up something that highlights a divide over that and maybe makes it appear as if the nation is divided over [the Islamic State group]?" Corker , R-Tenn., reportedly said. "It doesn't make a lot of sense to me."
Email: jgould@defensenews.com
Twitter: @reporterjoe
Joe Gould was the senior Pentagon reporter for Defense News, covering the intersection of national security policy, politics and the defense industry. He had previously served as Congress reporter.
