The bombing campaign against ISIS began on August 8, 2014, with President Obama declaring that he had no intention of the United States “being the Iraqi air force.” With U.S. pilots having conducted almost 80 percent of all of the airstrikes against ISIS—in Iraq and Syria—Obama’s expressed concern from last year is now the reality. Since the bombs started dropping there were other intermittent deployment announcements, including on September 2: “350 additional U.S. military personnel to protect our diplomatic facilities and personnel in Baghdad,” and on November 7: “1500 additional U.S. military personnel in a non-combat role to train, advise, and assist Iraqi Security Forces, including Kurdish forces.”

What Obama administration officials have attempted to emphasize with each new announcement is that the latest introduction of troops or tasks is logical, necessary, and will have an impact on achieving the strategic objective of the degrading and destroying ISIS. Just Wednesday, Brett McGurk, the deputy special presidential envoy for the global coalition to counter ISIS, told reporters: “Given the fact that the Iraqis have put the Anbar operation center there, I think this will have a fairly dramatic effect on just their situational awareness of the enemy.” If 450 more U.S. advisors—who will not arrive at the base for six to eight weeks—actually have this substantial of an impact on the course of the conflict it would be astonishing and unprecedented. And when they eventually fail to achieve this effect, most politicians and pundits will have forgotten this pledge, as they have for many others made by Obama administration officials over the past year regarding the campaign against ISIS.