ABC NEWS:
" Malcolm Turnbull pours cold water on Tony Abbott's call for consideration of ground troops in Iraq, Syria
By political reporter Anna Henderson
Updated about 10 hours ago
Malcolm Turnbull has rebuffed Tony Abbott's suggestion that Western nations should consider sending special forces ground troops into Iraq and Syria, saying there are no "current" plans to change the nature of Australia's deployment.
Australia is part of the coalition air strikes offensive over Iraq and Syria and has provided defence advisors and trainers for the Iraqi army, but has not committed any combat troops.
Former prime minister Tony Abbott raised the issue at the Margaret Thatcher Lecture in London, as part of his first major speech since losing the prime ministership.
Mr Abbott told the audience of Tory ministers and Conservative Party members that Coalition airstrikes in Iraq and Syria had helped contain the advance of the Islamic State (IS) terrorist group, but it had not been defeated.
"Because it can't be defeated without more effective local forces on the ground," Mr Abbott said.
"Everyone should recoil from an escalating air campaign, perhaps with Western special forces on the ground as well as trainers, in a part of the world that's such a witches' brew of danger and complexity and where nothing ever has a happy ending.
"Yet as Margaret Thatcher so clearly understood over the Falklands: Those that won't use decisive force, where needed, end up being dictated to by those who will.
"Of course, no American or British or Australian parent should face bereavement in a fight far away — but what is the alternative?
"Leaving anywhere, even Syria, to the collective determination of Russia, Iran and Daesh [IS] should be too horrible to contemplate."
Mr Turnbull stepped away from Mr Abbott's remarks.
"We don't have any plans to change the nature of our deployment in that theatre; that is not to say they won't change in the future," he said.
"Just as we have to be agile, in terms of innovation policy, we have to be agile in terms of our approach to the security challenges we face.
"We have no plans to change the nature of the deployment at the present time."
The Prime Minister said Mr Abbott has had "a remarkable career in public life" and "his views are in hot demand everywhere in the world".
Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said he had received reports Australian airstrikes were degrading and diminishing IS.
"I'm not sure that the case has been made for any expansion," he said.
"If Malcolm Turnbull has any plans to expand Australian boots on the ground in Syria as Tony Abbott is suggesting, I think we deserve to hear what those plans are.
"I don't know Australia wading in with some sort of naive approach will add a lot to what is already the misery going on there."
Abbott creating problems for the Australian Government.
