The Iraqi government was engaged this week in a ferocious battle with al Qaida–affiliated militants who have captured the strategic cities of Fallujah and Ramadi in the western province of Anbar, raising the prospect of all-out civil war. The province, where almost a third of the 4,400 U.S. fatalities occurred in some of the Iraq War’s bloodiest fighting, has been overrun in recent weeks by fighters from the al Qaida–linked Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). As government forces surrounded and shelled Fallujah and carried out airstrikes on insurgent-held areas, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki appealed to regional Sunni tribes and residents to “expel the terrorists.”
The U.S. this week stepped up shipments of drones and Hellfire missiles to the Iraqi military, amid fears that ISIS now controls a 400-mile swath across western Iraq and the north of neighboring Syria. But Secretary of State John Kerry made clear that no American troops would be sent in to help al-Maliki’s government. “This is their fight,” said Kerry, “but we’re going to help them in their fight.”
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