Pentagon chief: Offensive to retake Raqqa from ISIS to start within weeks

The offensive to retake Raqqa, ISIS’s de facto capital in Syria, will begin in several weeks, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said Wednesday. 

{mosads}”It starts in the next few weeks,” Carter said in an exclusive interview with NBC News. “That has long been our plan and we will be capable of resourcing both,” referring to the push to retake Mosul.

“It’s been long a part of our plan that the Mosul operation would kick off when it did. This was a plan that goes back many months now and that Raqqa would follow soon behind,” he added. 

The U.S. has approximately 300 special operations troops inside Syria. 

The Raqqa offensive would begin just weeks after the offensive to retake Mosul, the terrorist group’s stronghold in Iraq, began on Oct. 17.

Carter said U.S. troops are accompanying Iraqi security forces and Kurdish peshmerga as they advance toward Mosul.  

“So they will get nearer to the city as those forces get nearer to the city,” he said. “We are not going to be part of the occupation or hold forces.” 

There are more than 5,000 U.S. troops in Iraq.