WASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama said Thursday night that he authorized the U.S. military to launch targeted airstrikes if Islamic militants advance toward American personnel in northern Iraq.
He also said the military carried out airdrops of humanitarian aid to Iraqi religious groups threatened by the extremists.
"Today America is coming to help," Obama said.
The announcements marked the deepest American engagement in Iraq since U.S. troops withdrew in late 2011 after nearly a decade of war.
Obama acknowledged that the prospect of a new round of U.S. military action would be a cause for concern among many Americans. He vowed anew not to put American combat troops back on the ground in Iraq and said there was no U.S. military solution to the crisis.
"As commander in chief, I will not allow the United States to be drawn into fighting another war in Iraq," Obama said.
Even so, he outlined a rationale for airstrikes if members of the Islamic State militant group advance on American troops in the northern city of Irbil, which is the Kurdish region's capital, and the U.S. Consulate there. The troops were sent to Iraq earlier this year as part of the White House response to the group's swift movement across the border with Syria and into Iraq.
"When the lives of American citizens are at risk, we will take action," Obama said. "That's my responsibility as commander in chief."
He said he had also authorized the use of targeted military strikes if necessary to help the Iraqi security forces protect civilians.
The Pentagon said Thursday's airdrops were performed by one C-17 and two C-130 cargo aircraft that together delivered a total of 72 bundles of food and water. They were escorted by two F/A-18 fighters from an undisclosed air base in the region.
The planes delivered 5,300 gallons of fresh drinking water and 8,000 prepackaged meals and were over the drop area for less than 15 minutes at a low altitude.
Earlier in the day, administration aides said Obama was considering airdrops of food and medicine to address a humanitarian crisis among as many as 50,000 members of religious minority groups in Iraq, some of whom have been dying of heat and thirst on a mountaintop where they took shelter after death threats from Islamic State fighters.
The president cast the mission to assist the Yazidis, who follow an ancient religion with ties to Zoroastrianism, as part of the American mandate to assist around the world when the U.S. has the unique capabilities to help avert a massacre.
In those cases, Obama said, "we can act carefully and responsibly to prevent a potential act of genocide."
Airstrikes
Before Obama's announcement, airstrikes began on towns in northern Iraq seized by members of the Islamis State, Kurdish and Iraqi officials said.
They called it the first stage of a U.S.-led intervention to blunt the militants' advance and provide emergency aid to tens of thousands of refugees.
The Pentagon denied that U.S. forces had begun a bombing campaign, but officials said it was possible that allies of the United States -- either the Iraqi or Turkish military -- had conducted the bombing.
Kurdish and Iraqi officials attributed the bombing campaign to U.S. forces. An announcement on Kurdish television of what was described as an American intervention prompted street celebrations and horn honking by residents of towns under siege by the Islamic State militant group.
Kurdish officials said the bombings initially targeted Islamic State fighters who had seized two towns, Gwer and Mahmour. A top Iraqi official in Baghdad close to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said the Americans had consulted with the Iraqi government Thursday about starting the campaign, the government had agreed and the bombing began.
The U.S. and the United Nations Security Council on Thursday condemned the militants' attacks on the minority groups.
The council said the attacks could constitute crimes against humanity and that those responsible should be held accountable. It also urged international support for the Iraqi government.
"The members of the Security Council also urge all parties to stop human-rights violations and abuses and ensure humanitarian access and facilitate the delivery of assistance to those fleeing the violence," British U.N. Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant said.
White House press secretary Josh Earnest said the United States was disturbed by what he described as "cold and calculated" attacks by the Islamic State on religious minority groups in Iraq.
"These actions have exacerbated an already dire crisis, and the situation is nearing a humanitarian catastrophe," Earnest said. The campaign of attacks by the Islamic State, he said, "demonstrates a callous disregard for human rights and is deeply disturbing."
Asked specifically about military options, Earnest said, "I'm not in a position to rule things on the table or off the table." But he reiterated that there would be no U.S. combat troops in Iraq and that any military action would be extremely limited.
"There are many problems in Iraq," he said. "This one is a particularly acute one, because we're seeing people persecuted because of their ethnic or religious identities."
Earnest singled out the plight of the Yazidis. Thousands fled their homes after the Islamic State issued an ultimatum to convert to Islam, pay a religious fine, flee their homes or face death.
Earnest added: "There are no American military solutions to the problems in Iraq. These problems can only be solved with Iraqi political solutions."
The Iraqi government has previously sought military assistance from the U.S., but Obama has resisted. He has cast any military action as contingent on Iraq reforming its political system to be more inclusive, a step the U.S. hopes would lessen the country's sectarian tension.
Al-Maliki, who has led the country since 2006, is fighting for a third term after his political bloc won the most seats in April parliamentary elections, but Sunnis have long accused al-Maliki of marginalizing their community, and even many of his Shiite and Kurdish allies say he has monopolized power.
But both White House and Pentagon officials have said privately that the United States would not intervene militarily until al-Maliki stepped down. Al-Maliki's political party was supposed to announce a new candidate for prime minister Thursday but has not done so yet.
Administration officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly, said Thursday that the crisis on Mount Sinjar was forcing their hand.
Some 40 children have already died from the heat and dehydration, according to the United Nations Children's Fund, while as many as 50,000 people have been sheltering in the bare mountains without food, water or access to supplies.
Seizure of Mosul Dam
Meanwhile, the Islamic State extremists seized Iraq's largest dam Thursday, placing them in control of enormous power and water resources and access to the Tigris River, which runs through the heart of Baghdad.
Thursday's dam seizure was the latest in a string of victories by the Sunni radical group, which has expanded its hold in northern Iraq and unleashed a string of bombings that killed at least 92 people in the capital Wednesday and Thursday.
After a week of attempts, the radical Islamist gunmen successfully stormed the Mosul Dam over the Tigris River on Thursday and forced Kurdish forces to withdraw from the area, residents living near the dam said. They spoke on condition of anonymity due to safety concerns.
The al-Qaida breakaway group posted a statement online Thursday confirming it had taken control of the dam and vowing to continue "the march in all directions" as it expands the self-ruled state it has declared in broad stretches of territory straddling the Iraqi-Syrian border.
The group said it has seized 17 Iraqi cities, towns and targets -- including the dam and a military base -- over the past five days. The statement could not be verified, but it was posted on a site frequently used by the group.
Halgurd Hekmat, a spokesman for the Kurdish fighters, said Thursday that clashes around the dam were ongoing and he didn't know who currently had control over it.
The Sunni militant group has established its idea of an Islamic state in the territory it controls in Iraq and Syria, imposing its harsh interpretation of Islamic law. Iraqi government forces, Kurds and allied Sunni tribal militiamen have been struggling to dislodge the Islamic State militants and its Sunni allies with little apparent success.
The Mosul Dam -- once called the Saddam Dam, after ousted dictator Saddam Hussein -- is just north of Iraq's second-largest city, Mosul, which fell to the militants on June 10.
Fighting intensified in the region Sunday after the nearby towns of Zumar and Sinjar fell to the militants, exacerbating the country's humanitarian crisis as some 200,000 Iraqis joined the 1.5 million people already displaced by violence this year.
The Kurdish fighters, known as the peshmerga, had initially managed to stall the militant advances, but their defense has waned in recent weeks. On Monday, al-Maliki ordered the Iraqi air force to provide aerial support for the Kurds, in a rare show of cooperation between Baghdad and the Kurdish regional government that underscored the seriousness of the crisis.
The seizing of dams and reservoirs gives the militants control over water and electricity that they can use to help build support in the territory they now rule by providing the scarce resources to residents. Or they could sell the resources as a lucrative source of revenue.
There are also fears the militants could release the dam waters and devastate the country all the way to the capital Baghdad, though analysts said maintaining the dam's power and water supplies is key to the group's attempts to build a state.
"It's difficult to imagine that the dam will not be immediately contested -- it's real strategic property," Ramzy Mardini, an Iraq expert with the Washington-based Atlantic Council, said of Thursday's Mosul Dam seizure. "With the dam in its control, the Islamic State can use water as a coercive tool in creating dependency or as a deterrent threat hovering in the background. It could potentially flood Baghdad or cut off its supply."
Earlier this year, the group's fighters captured the smaller Fallujah Dam on the Euphrates River when they seized the nearby city of Fallujah. Repeatedly, the militants have used it as a weapon, opening it to flood downriver when government forces move in on the city.
For some Baghdad residents, the dam takeover represents a vulnerable artery leading into the capital.
Zainab Mustafa, a Baghdad housewife, said she felt great anxiety over the dam takeover and had little faith in the central government's ability to protect its citizens.
"I think the danger is real and this time we will not have a place to hide," she said. "People here in Baghdad are now really afraid after the takeover of the Mosul Dam by the insurgents."
Also Thursday, the militants overran a cluster of predominantly Christian villages alongside the country's semiautonomous Kurdish region, sending tens of thousands of civilians and Kurdish fighters fleeing from the area, several priests in northern Iraq said Thursday.
The capture of Qaraqoush, Iraq's biggest Christian village, and at least four other nearby hamlets, brings the Islamic State to the very edge of the Iraqi Kurdish territory and its capital, Irbil.
Even camps for the displaced were coming under threat as the militant offensive progresses. Gunmen approached the edge of the heavily populated Khazer camp, which is protected by peshmerga forces, sending many fearful refugees running into the desert to escape.
The latest setbacks for peshmerga forces have caught many Iraqis off-guard, as the peshmerga are commonly regarded as a more capable force than the Iraqi military.
Ayham Kamel, an Iraq analyst at Eurasia Group said the pershmerga's capabilities were apparently overplayed and the Islamic militants are in a position to threaten the self-ruled Kurdish region.
The Kurdish fighters "were too bold with their initial statements that peshmerga is the only capable defensive force," he said.
Saad Youssef, a Sunni teacher from Baghdad, said Iraqis are deeply concerned over the possible breakup of their country, since the government has failed to stop the militants' push.
"Now we have [the Islamic State] republic, Kurdish republic and Baghdad republic, and we could have more republics in the near future if the militants are not stopped," he said.
Information for this article was contributed by Helene Cooper, Alissa J. Rubin of The New York Times and by Julie Pace, Robert Burns, Bradley Klapper, Bram Janssen, Sinan Salaheddin, Murtada Faraj, Thomas Adamson, Lori Hinnant, Trenton Daniel and Zeina Karam of The Associated Press.
A Section on 08/08/2014