Dempsey: ‘The Global Security Environment Is As Uncertain As I’ve Ever Seen It’

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Washington Free Beacon:

Blake Seitz

July 7, 2015

 

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey testified Tuesday that he has never seen a more precarious global security environment than the one that the U.S. faces today.

 

“I’ve said before that the global security environment is as uncertain as I’ve ever seen it,” Dempsey told the Senate Armed Services Committee. “The world is rapidly changing everywhere and we’re seeing significant shifts in an already complex strategic landscape.”

 

Dempsey made this admission during testimony about the U.S.’s war of attrition against the Islamic State (IS, also known as ISIL), but the security threats he described spanned the globe.

 

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Senate Panel Grills US Military Leaders Over IS Strategy

VOA News

July 07, 2015

 

Republican senators vented frustrations over U.S. efforts to fight Islamic State radicals, and grilled Secretary of Defense Ash Carter and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey at an Armed Services Committee hearing Tuesday.

 

During testimony, Carter acknowledged publicly for the first time the United States was only training about 60 Syrian opposition fighters to battle the Islamic State group as of July 3. U.S. policymakers had hoped the program, launched in May in Jordan and Turkey, would train as many as 5,400 fighters a year as a strategy of engaging local partners to combat extremists. Carter cited rigorous U.S. vetting of recruits, adding that number would increase as the United States learned how to better streamline vetting.

 

Committee Chairman John McCain, a vocal critic of the Obama administration's foreign policy, told Carter: “I got to tell you that after four years, Mr. Secretary, that is not a very impressive number.” “The number is much smaller than we hoped for at this point,” Carter responded, but he said the initiative remains an essential element of U.S. military strategy in the region

 

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5,400....60