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U.S.: Anti-Islamic State Coalition at Odds over Syria Strategy
(Wall Street Journal) Felicia Schwartz - Brett McGurk, the Obama administration's deputy envoy in the effort against Islamic State, told the House Foreign Affairs Committee Wednesday that the coalition is "firmly united" in its strategy in Iraq but holds divergent views on how to deal with Syria. "Many of our coalition partners do not envision themselves as having signed up to bring about a political transition in Syria through military force, considering such a transition potentially even more destabilizing than the situation we face now," he said. "At the same time, other coalition partners are urging strikes against the Assad regime, considering the regime a central source of instability in the region....We are firm in our commitment that any future government cannot include Bashar al-Assad, who has forfeited any claim of legitimacy to govern and remains a magnet for terrorism in the region." McGurk reiterated the administration's view that the operation to defeat Islamic State would take years. "We are now in the earliest phases of phase one."