WASHINGTON: The White House said on Tuesday that sending US Special Operations Forces back to Iraq was “a viable potential course of action”.

Also on Tuesday, President Obama sent a War Powers Resolution letter to Congress informing the lawmakers that he had ordered the deployment of 275 US Armed Forces personnel to provide security for US personnel and the US Embassy in Baghdad.

In a separate briefing, the State Department said that the United States was open to talking to Iran about the situation in Iraq but was not considering a joint US-Iranian military action against the Iraqi rebels.

Although the White House insisted that it may only send a small contingent of Special Operations Forces for advising the Iraqis, ABC News reported that those advisers could be involved in field operations with Iraqi forces, if needed.

The expected move would reverse US President Barack Obama’s public stance of not sending troops back into Iraq.

A new opinion poll released on Tuesday showed strong opposition in the US to sending any troops into Iraq.

The survey by the Public Policy Polling found 74 per cent of Americans were opposed to sending combat troops back into Iraq, with only 16pc supporting that option.

Majorities of Republicans, Democrats and independents all said they were strongly opposed to sending in combat troops. Just over a quarter of Republicans support deploying them.

More than half of those surveyed said they agreed with President Obama that US troops shouldn’t return to Iraq. Just over a quarter, by contrast, agreed with Republican Senator John McCain that troops should have remained in Iraq past 2011.

“This force is deploying for the purpose of protecting US citizens and property, if necessary, and is equipped for combat. This force will remain in Iraq until the security situation becomes such that it is no longer needed,” Mr Obama said in the letter.

The US media noted that President Obama has now added a qualifier to his pledge. Instead of saying that he will not send any US troops back into Iraq, as he said previously, he is now saying he will not send “any combat troops”.

This opened an option for sending troops back to Iraq as long they were not called combat troops but, as the president said in his letter to Congress, those troops would be “equipped for combat.”

At the State Department, spokesperson Jen Psaki said that while the United States would welcome an Iranian role in stabilising Iraq, it was not considering joint military actions in the region.

Published in Dawn, June 18th, 2014