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Obama praises 'fallen heroes,' touts end of Mid East wars
by Staff Writers
Washington (AFP) May 28, 2015


Biden tries to smooth Iraq ties after Pentagon outburst
Washington (AFP) May 25, 2015 - US Vice President Joe Biden on Monday sought to end an embarrassing rift between Washington and Baghdad after Pentagon boss Ash Carter blamed Iraqi forces for the fall of Ramadi.

The White House said Biden called Iraqi's prime minister Haider al-Abadi, just hours after the US Defense Secretary's suggested the Islamic State group won control of the city because "Iraqi forces showed no will to fight."

Biden "recognized the enormous sacrifice and bravery of Iraqi forces over the past eighteen months in Ramadi and elsewhere," the White House said.

As well as rowing back Carter's comments, Biden called to "reaffirm US support for the Iraqi government's fight against" Islamic State jihadists.

Carter's comments were seen as undercutting a US-Iraqi collective front in the fight against the radical militants.

They were also seen as humiliating for Iraq's prime minister, as he desperately tries to hold his country together with a thinly stretched army and assorted ethnic and sectarian militias whose loyalties lie outside Baghdad.

Abadi himself expressed surprise at Carter's remarks and suggested the head of the Pentagon "was fed with the wrong information."

Iraqi troops had held out in Ramadi for more than a year before succumbing to the highly-motivated highly-armed force a week ago.

Iranian hardliners were quick to seize on Carter's remarks, as they continued to to build influence with Iraq's Shiite majority.

"How can you be in that country under the pretext of protecting the Iraqis and do nothing? This is no more than being an accomplice in a plot," said Qassem Suleimani, the Revolutionary Guards' commander of foreign operations.

It was not immediately clear what repercussions there may be for Carter, who took office in February.

The nuclear expert caused angst in the White House even before being formally sworn in, by publicly supporting the US supply of weapons to Ukraine, a position the White House has been reluctant to embrace.

At that time the White House pointedly noted that any decision would be for Obama, not the secretary of defence, to make.

US President Barack Obama paid a Memorial Day tribute to America's "fallen heroes" Monday, stressing the heavy burden of perennial wars and underscoring his decision to pull troops from Afghanistan and Iraq.

Echoing Abraham Lincoln's praise for those who offered the "last full measure of devotion," Obama praised "everyday heroes" who died in the "mountains of Korea, the jungles of Vietnam, the deserts of the Middle East" and in countless other conflagrations.

While looking to the past, Obama's address was tinged by war politics that have pervaded Washington for a generation and which are still alive today.

"For many of us, this Memorial Day is especially meaningful; it is the first since our war in Afghanistan came to an end," he said.

"Today is the first Memorial Day in 14 years that the United States is not engaged in a major ground war."

The Nobel Prize-winning president fulfilled an election promise to wind down the wars in Afghanistan that killed 2,200 Americans and Iraq where there are now fewer than 10,000 non-combat troops.

But Monday's comments come as criticism of his actions in Iraq reach a fresh crescendo.

Republicans in particular accuse Obama of creating a dangerous power vacuum that has been filled by jihadists from the Islamic State group.

The group now controls swaths of Iraq and Syria and looks poised for further offensives against an outmatched Iraqi army.

Some are pressing Obama to put American boots back on the ground.

He has refused to return combat troops to Iraq and looked to air power, drones, diplomacy and education gathering to counter Al Qaeda, Islamic State and other groups.

Obama on Monday again sought to draw a line under the era of the "9/11 generation" which saw the United States enmeshed in vast battles on multiple fronts.


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