PRESIDENT OBAMA SOUGHT to prepare Americans for an extended presence in the skies over Iraq, telling reporters on Saturday that the airstrikes he ordered this week could go on for months as Iraqis try to build a new government.

“I don’t think we’re going to solve this problem in weeks,” Obama said before leaving for a two-week vacation on Martha’s Vineyard. “This is going to be a long-term project.”

The president repeated his insistence that the United States would not send ground combat troops back to Iraq.

But he pledged that it and other countries would stand with the Iraqi leaders against militants if they built an inclusive government in the months ahead.

READ MORE: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/10/world/middleeast/us-airstrikes-on-militants-in-iraq.html?emc=edit_na_20140809

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