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U.S. Taps Old Allies for New Iraq War

(Daily Beast) Eli Lake - U.S. diplomats and military officers are reaching out to discarded tribal allies in Iraq. On Wednesday, Brett McGurk, the senior State Department official responsible for policy on Iraq, met in Baghdad at the home of former exile leader Ahmed Chalabi. The outreach to Chalabi is part of a scramble by U.S. military, diplomatic, and intelligence agencies to respond to the growing violence in Iraq. On Thursday, Obama announced that he was sending up to 300 U.S. special operations forces to Iraq - in addition to the 275 such troops already in country. Manned and unmanned aircraft are also now in the region. Waleed al-Rawi, a former Iraqi general, said, "My contacts are telling me [that tribal leaders] are willing to talk to the Americans about the entire situation. They say they will fight al-Qaeda but we need to change the government first."
2014-06-23 00:00:00
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