WASHINGTON: The United States will continue its air strikes in Afghanistan and Syria in 2016 as well, says the head of the US Air Forces Central Command.
Lt Gen Charles Brown Jr. believes that in Afghanistan, the strikes will focus on preventing any setback to the Afghan military in the fight against the Taliban. In Syria, he expects the US and coalition air power to do significant damage to the militant Islamic State (IS) group in 2016, says a report published in the US Air Force Times newspaper on Sunday.
“By the time we get to the end of 2016, I hope to be pretty well done with Daesh [IS],”said Lt Gen Brown.
“Our support for the Afghan security forces is more in an extreme basis to ensure their success and not have a strategic setback,” he added.
The report notes that in Afghanistan, the US Air Force is still engaged in combat, even though the combat mission is technically over.
On Dec 8, the US aircraft repulsed a Taliban attack on the Kandahar airfield, where US airmen with Train, Advise Assist Command-Air are mentoring the Afghan air force. US air power has also been called on to assist Afghan troops and police.
But Gen Brown says the US is not supposed to provide routine close-air support to the Afghans. However, US forces in Afghanistan often work with Afghan security forces and the air force supports both.
In November, US F-16s provided close-air support to a US and Afghan convoy that came under attack.
The Air Force Times, however, notes that the air war against the IS is expected to last for years.
Gen Brown told the newspaper that in November, the US ramped up airstrikes in both Iraq and Syria to support Iraqi and Kurdish forces. The strategy against Daesh now involves attacking tankers that carry the oil that the IS sells.
The report notes that US special operations ground troops, deployed recently in Iraq, may become involved in direct combat strikes against the IS, which will also increase the air force’s involvement in the war.
The expectation is that the US-led air campaign will further intensify, with commanders using more airstrikes to target more IS infrastructure and weaken the group’s hold on key cities and towns inside Iraq and Syria, the report adds.
It also notes that if the war intensifies, “the bulk of the burden would rest on the Air Force and the thousands of pilots and airmen who are running the day-to-day operations of the intense airstrike campaign against Islamic State targets”.
Gen Brown warns that Russia’s involvement in Syria has further complicated the role of the US Air Force in that country. But he points that while Russia has deployed S-400 surface-to-air missiles in Syria, Moscow and Washington do have a memorandum of understanding on how aircraft from both countries should interact.
“We have pretty good connectivity with the Russians,” Gen Brown said. “With our MoU, there are things that are in there that talk about ... how we’re not going to show hostile acts or hostile intent from the coalition toward the Russians or from the Russians toward the coalition.”
Published in Dawn, December 28th, 2015
