President Obama has declared, repeatedly, that U.S. ground troops will not have a combat mission in his war against the Islamic State. Last week, Obama ardently pledged that he would not be “dragged” into another Iraq ground war.

The president certainly sounded decisive. This week, White House press secretary Josh Earnest swore that the president had definitively “ruled out” U.S. boots on the ground “engaged in a combat role in Iraq and in Syria.”