国际英语新闻:White House: No Plans to Send US Ground Troops to Iraq

Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Jordan Friday, Iraq's Vice President Ayad Allawi was critical of the U.S. air campaign, portraying it as "failed" in terms of controlling the spread of the Islamic State.

"There are no good news from the international coalition, and there is no strategy, so I asked the Iraqi leaders to put a strategy together and to present it to the coalition." Allawi told reporters at Forum. "The international coalition meets but without any results, the airstrikes do not solve the problem."

Coalition forces conducted five airstrikes in Syria from Thursday to Friday; another 15 coalition bombings in Iraq focused on the IS stronghold of Mosul and the newly-captured city of Ramadi.

A spokesman for the Popular Mobilization units, the paramilitary group allied with Iraqi government troops, told AFP that a counter-offensive to retake the city will happen "in the coming days" with what he said would be "tens of thousands" of fighters.

Islamic State made further inroads toward its goal of creating a transnational caliphate on Friday, seizing the last border crossing between Syria and Iraq that was held by the Damascus government, according to the Britain-based monitoring group Syrian Observatory for Human Rights [SOHR].

The SOHR says the Syrian government now controls less than half the country.

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