U.K., Denmark, Belgium join coalition
BEIRUT — American warplanes and drones hit Islamic State armour, Humvees, checkpoints and bunkers in air strikes Friday targeting the extremists in Syria and Iraq, as the U.S.-led coalition expanded to include Britain, Denmark and Belgium.
The European countries committed to take part only in the Iraq part of the military campaign, leaving the operation in Syria to the United States and five Arab allies who began conducting air strikes there on Tuesday. Still, the broadening of the coalition provides a welcome boost for U.S. President Barack Obama and the American-led campaign.
The U.S.-led operation aims to roll back and ultimately crush the Islamic State group, also known as ISIS or ISIL, which has carved out a proto-state stretching from Syria’s northern border with Turkey to the outskirts of Baghdad. The militants have employed brutal force to achieve their goals, massacring captured Syrian and Iraqi troops, terrorizing minorities in both countries and beheading two American journalists and a British aid worker.
While striking fear into its opponents, IS’s tactics have also helped galvanize the international community to move against the extremists. France has already joined the U.S.led effort in Iraq, and is considering expanding its role to Syria as well. The Netherlands, too, has said it would take part in the bombing campaign in Iraq.
Denmark said it would send seven F-16 fighter jets and 250 air- and groundcrew, while Belgium will contribute six F-16s that are already en route to Jordan so they can go into action as early as Saturday.
“No one should be ducking in this case,” said Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt. “Everyone should contribute.”
British lawmakers voted Friday to join the coalition. London is expected to deploy Tornado fighters, based in Cyprus — within striking distance of northern Iraq.
“This is about psychopathic terrorists that are trying to kill us and we do have to realize that, whether we like it or not, they have already declared war on us,” Prime Minister David Cameron told a tense House of Commons in a more than six-hour debate. “There isn’t a ‘walk on by’ option. There isn’t an option of just hoping this will go away.”
U.S. Central Command said that air strikes outside the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk destroyed three Islamic State Humvees, disabled two armed vehicles and damaged an armoured truck. More strikes west of Baghdad and near the Syrian border knocked out a guard shack, armed vehicles, a bunker and a checkpoint.
In Syria, the U.S. destroyed four tanks and damaged another outside the city of Deir el-Zour on the Euphrates River.
Those strikes marked the second consecutive day that the United States and its Arab allies have taken aim at the militants near the border with Iraq. Coalition planes pounded a dozen makeshift oilproducing facilities in the same area on Thursday.
Syrian activists said the Americanled air campaign also hit the Tanak oilfield as well as the Qouriyeh oilproducing area in Deir el-Zour on Friday.