National security adviser Susan Rice said Wednesday that airstrikes carried out Monday against Khorasan targets "had an impact" in combating the growing presence of the group.
"We think the strikes had an impact, an important impact,'' Rice told Matt Lauer on TODAY Wednesday. "Obviously this won't be the last of our efforts, but this was a first wave."
Rice's comments come just hours before President Obama addresses the United Nations General Assembly and chairs a Security Council meeting focused on the global threat posed by ISIS.
More from Susan Rice:
- On any potentially active ISIS plots to attack America: "We do not have any indications, at the present, of active, concrete plotting by ISIL [ISIS] against the United States homeland,'' Rice said. "But we do know that they're dangerous...and they could with time be a proximate threat to the homeland."
- On whether Khorasan leader Muhsin al-Fadhli is the new Osama bin Laden: "No. He was an aide to bin Laden back in the early stages of al Qaeda,'' Rice explained. "He's obviously a dangerous operative, but no, he has nothing like the cachet of bin Laden."
- On President Obama's promise of no US combat troops on the ground in Iraq: "What none of us think is necessary is a large ground combat operation of the sort we had for many years in Iraq."
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