Baghdad: The United States has bombed militants near Baghdad in support of Iraqi forces, striking close to the capital for the first time in its expanded campaign against Islamic State jihadists.
But in a sign of their growing strength, a monitoring group said the jihadists had managed to bring down a Syrian warplane conducting strikes over their stronghold of Raqa in north-central Syria.
The US air strike against IS fighters in the Sadr al-Yusufiyah area, 25 kilometres from Baghdad, came as world diplomats pledged to support Iraq in its fight against the militants and less than a week after US President Barack Obama ordered a “relentless” war against IS.
The top US military leader told Congress on Tuesday that if Mr Obama’s expanded military campaign to destroy Islamic extremists fails, he would recommend that the United States consider deploying American ground forces to Iraq.
Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a Senate panel that the goal for American advisers is to help Iraqi forces with planning, logistics and coordinating military efforts by coalition partners to take out members of the IS.
“US military forces continued to attack (IS) terrorists in Iraq, employing attack and fighter aircraft to conduct two air strikes Sunday and Monday in support of Iraqi security forces near Sinjar and southwest of Baghdad,” the US Central Command said in a statement.
The strikes destroyed six IS vehicles near Sinjar and an IS position southwest of Baghdad that had been firing on Iraqi forces.
Iraqi security spokesman Lieutenant General Qassem Atta welcomed the expanded American action, saying the US “carried out an important strike against an enemy target.”
Meanwhile, according to a New York Times report, Mr Obama has said he would authorise military forces to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad if regime troops attempt to shoot down American planes.
The move would represent a significant shift in Washington’s stated aims in Syria and Iraq.
