For the first time, the United States launched manned airstrikes
from a base in Turkey against ISIS forces in Syria, the Pentagon said
Wednesday.
The attacks from
Incirlik Air Base are part of an agreement reached last month between NATO
allies Turkey and the United States.
The United
States has long wanted to use Turkish bases for manned airstrikes against ISIS
in Syria and parts of Iraq. Such access should shorten flight times for U.S.
(and presumably allied) fighter jets -- especially into Syria, where the group
calling itself the Islamic State has its de facto capital, Raqqa -- compared
with taking off from bases in Iraq or aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf.
Washington has
made going after ISIS one of its national security priorities.
While it has
helped train moderate Syrian rebels as well as Iraqi forces, the U.S. military
hasn't put any of its troops in combat roles -- though Gen. Raymond Odierno,
the Army's outgoing chief of staff, said such a move should be an option if
more progress isn't made against ISIS.
So far, the air campaign has been America's biggest tool in its
fight. Turkey's cooperation in this regard, paved by a July deal between
President Barack Obama and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan allowing for the expanded access,
should be a big help.
Turkey has long
endured the buildup of ISIS on its porous border with Syria, but until July was
reluctant to permit the United States to use its bases to strike the radical
militant group.
Ankara has been
under pressure from allies to move more directly against ISIS, and that
pressure grew inside
Turkey after a series of attacks blamed on the group.
On July 20, a
suicide blast that authorities blame on ISIS killed
32 people in Suruc, Turkey. Also that month, Turkey said ISIS militants
attacked Turkish troops at the Turkey-Syria border, killing a soldier.
In addition to letting the United States use its bases for
strikes, Turkey began launching its own against ISIS last month.
The country also
struck against the Turkish-Kurdish separatist group PKK, launching airstrikes
in July against its camps in Iraq.
Turkey has long
had troubled relations with its ethnic Kurdish population. The PKK-Turkey
conflict has killed 45,000 people since 1984.
A ceasefire in
2013 paused the conflict, but Turkey said the PKK recently violated the truce,
blaming it in the deaths of security officers.
Though Wednesday
marked the first manned U.S. airstrikes under the deal, lethal U.S. drone
strikes into Syria from southern Turkey began
this month.
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