US weighs Iraq airstrikes, Obama says he won't send combat troops

Washington (CNN) -- U.S. military planners trying to find a way to help Iraq fend off the sweeping advances of militant fighters are worried that even airstrikes could prove futile, several officials have told CNN.

Among other complications, U.S. officials don't have good intelligence about where militants are, and even if they did, the militants don't have the kinds of targets -- command and control centers, air defense sites, military bases -- that lend themselves to aerial attacks, the officials said.

Fighters from the militant group known as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, have made breathtaking gains in Iraq in recent days, seizing the country's second-largest city, Mosul, on Tuesday before pressing south toward Baghdad. Large swaths of the county's north are now under its control.

One official said that the U.S. military and intelligence community had been watching events in Iraq closely, and there is some surprise in the last few days about how fast ISIS has moved and the scope of the lack of response from Iraqi forces.

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Short of sending ground troops, U.S. officials are looking at 'the full range of options,' one senior U.S. official told CNN. Those options range from increasing U.S. surveillance flights over ISIS areas to potential airstrikes, the official said.

The military has not finalized a proposed set of ISIS targets in Iraq for President Barack Obama, and Obama has not yet made a decision to authorize airstrikes, according to officials

Several more top-level meetings are scheduled in the next 48 hours, the officials said.

'We don't have an updated time frame to share with you at this point, but as we've said, we're working this on an urgent basis,' one senior administration official said.

Conducting airstrikes, with manned aircraft or drones, presents several problems now being discussed inside the administration, one official said.

According to the officials, those targeting problems include:

* The U.S. lacks credible, specific intelligence about where ISIS fighters are.

* Using drones to strike fighters moving on vehicles still requires very specific intelligence to assure who is being struck. Moreover, they say, drone strikes can kill individuals, but they don't change the military calculation or balance of power on the ground.

* There's no one on the ground, such as Air Force tactical air controllers, to call in precise airstrikes.

* ISIS doesn't have fixed positions such as command and control centers, air defense sites, military bases and radar facilities that could be hit to degrade the group's military capability.

* Fighters may be spread out inside population centers, which means airstrikes could risk civilian casualties and property destruction at the hands of the U.S. military.

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