Special to WorldTribune.com
France was set to deploy its lone aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf on Nov. 18 while Russia stepped up its attacks on Islamic State of Iraq and Levant’s (ISIL’s) stronghold in Raqqa, Syria.
The escalation of military operations by France and Russia are seen filling the void left by the United States, which experts say is crippling the fight against ISIL due to its strict rules of engagement.
“Our air campaign, since it began, has been the most restrictive in terms of rules of engagement that we have ever entered into in the last 25 years,” said Jack Keane, a retired Army four-star general who now chairs the Institute for the Study of War.
“This has been largely due to the White House’s insistence that there be zero civilian casualties, at the behest of the president.”
The Pentagon has confirmed that just one in four of all U.S. aerial missions actually dropped bombs or fired missiles.
President Barack Obama’s rules of engagement have “largely foreclosed our hitting moving targets in a timely manner,” said Gen. Keane, “because our pilots have to go through multiple levels of clearances, and eventually the target is lost.
“With fixed-site targets, if there are any civilians in the area, permission is usually denied, despite the fact that America has the best proven ability in the world to hit targets near civilian areas without hurting civilians.”
France said it was sending the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier to ease the burden on its 12 warplanes currently conducting missions against ISIL in Syria and Iraq from bases in Jordan and the UAE. The carrier will add 20 warplanes to the effort.
The Charles de Gaulle, Europe’s largest aircraft carrier, will also fill a huge gap that will be left when the USS Theodore Roosevelt leaves the region soon and until the USS Harry Truman arrives early next year.
France this week began air strikes on Raqqa, ISIL’s stronghold in Syria. Previously the French had conducted only a handful of strikes in Syria, focusing most of its strikes in Iraq as part of the U.S.-led coalition.
UK Defense Secretary Michael Fallon said France was right to attack Raqqa as it was clear that ISIL was planning and organizing terror attacks from there.
“We’ve seen attacks now in Ankara, we’ve seen attacks on a Russian airliner and now in Paris – all this is being masterminded from ISIL’s headquarters of operations in northeast Syria,” Fallon said.
Meanwhile, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Moscow launched cruise missiles at the ISIL stronghold on Nov. 17.
U.S. officials were quoted by the Reuters as saying Russia launched a “significant number” of strikes in Syria using both sea-launched cruise missiles and long-range bombers. Russian officials gave the U.S. advance notice of the strikes, reports said.
U.S. air strikes against ISIL limited by strict rules of engagement; French, Russians turn up heat added by World Tribune on
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