News: Victory in Kobani will be difficult to replicate

The defeat of Islamic State forces in the Syrian city of Kobani may be difficult to replicate quickly in other parts of Syria and Iraq, where ground forces are too weak to repel the militants.
Punishing airstrikes by a U.S.-led coalition contributed to the defeat of extremists in Kobani, which is on the border of Turkey. But resistance from hardened Kurdish ground forces proved decisive, according to military experts.
"The expectation of rapid and highly visible success in the air operation is misplaced," said former Defense Intelligence Agency official Jeff White, an analyst at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. "They (Kurds) are effective ground troops in this kind of war."
Combat troops capable of defeating the Islamic State and regaining territory are lacking in Syria and parts of Iraq. That makes coalition airstrikes in those areas less effective.
In Syria, moderate opposition forces opposed to the Islamic State have yet to receive promised U.S. military training. In Iraq, more than 1,000 U.S. advisers are helping to train the Iraqi military, which suffered humiliating defeats against Islamic State fighters last year.