The US on Monday said it has used air power in Syria in defense of allied rebel groups, signaling deeper involvement in the nation’s brutal four-year civil war.
The Pentagon confirmed that an air strike was carried out Friday last week in support of the New Syria Force, a US-allied group.
“We’ll take action to defend the New Syria Force that we’ve trained and equipped,” Pentagon spokesman Commander Bill Urban said.
He said “last Friday was the first one,” referring to the air strike.
Earlier, a senior administration official said the US had hit the al-Nusra Front in response to an attack on US trained rebels.
US President Barack Obama’s administration said on Monday it was prepared to take “additional steps” to defend US-trained and equipped forces, warning Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime “not to interfere.”
“The president approved this recently upon the recommendation of his senior military advisers,” a senior administration official said.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest said al-Assad’s regime had not so far hampered US-backed forces, but he nonetheless raised the possibility of strikes against it should the need arise.
The US, Earnest said, was “committed to using military force where necessary to protect the coalition-trained and equipped Syrian opposition fighters.”
The decision was taken under a 2001 rule authorizing the use of military force against terror groups, which critics say has already been stretched too far.
Officials argue that authority includes the ability to provide “defensive fire support.”
The US has trained and equipped a number of fighters — screened and determined to be “moderate” — to operate against the Islamic State group, but US-backed forces have yet to play a major role in turning the war and its fledgling local ground force has already suffered a series of reversals.
A 54-strong unit inserted into the rebels’ Division 30 has come under withering attack from the al-Nusra Front, with several members reportedly killed or captured.
Micah Zenko of the Council on Foreign Relations said the “truly significant decision” could potentially extend well beyond that small force.
US forces are “interspersed among large coherent units of several hundred fighters,” he said. “You can’t give air cover just to individual rebels.”
The US has agreed with Turkey to create what has been termed an “Islamic State-free zone” in northern Syria.
Details of the zone “remain to be worked out,” said a senior administration official, who asked not to be named.
However, it would entail Turkey, NATO’s only mainly Muslim member, supporting US “partners on the ground” already fighting the jihadists.
Ankara has also granted the US permission to use one of its bases to carry out air raids.
Monday’s announcement came as diplomatic efforts to halt the carnage in Syria resumed.
An estimated 140,000 have died in the conflict, which began as an uprising against the al-Assad regime, but has morphed into a religious and ethnic civil war.
A UN envoy recently presented his plan to resuscitate failed talks and foreign ministers from the US, Russia and Saudi Arabia held talks in Qatar on Monday.
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