Barack Obama: We won’t send US troops to combat IS

US president Barack Obama yesterday ruled out a shift in strategy in the fight against the Islamic State despite the deadly attacks in Paris last week, saying putting US troops on the ground to combat the group “would be a mistake”.

Obama, speaking at a news conference following a G20 leaders’ summit in Turkey, said that the US-led coalition fighting Islamic State in Iraq and Syria would redouble its efforts to implement its current strategy rather than moving in a new direction.

“There will be an intensification of the strategy that we put forward but the strategy that we put forward is the strategy that ultimately is going to work,” Obama told reporters.