Activists: Islamic State training to fly planes

Associated Press

BAGHDAD

Syrian activists say the Islamic State militant group has captured some MiG fighter jets and is test-flying the warplanes in Syria with the help of former Iraqi air force pilots.

Friday’s account by the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights could not be independently confirmed, and U.S. officials said they had no reports of the militants flying jets in support of their fighters in Iraq and Syria.

The observatory said the planes, seen flying over the Jarrah air base in the eastern countryside of Syria’s Aleppo province this week, are believed to be of the MiG-21 and MiG-23 variety. Rami Abdurrahman, director of the Observatory, said the planes have been flying at a low altitude, “apparently to avoid being detected by Syrian military radar in the area.”

He described the flights as a “moral victory” for the Islamic State, saying “the jets could not fly much farther without being knocked down” by the U.S. led-coalition that is conducting airstrikes in Iraq and Syria.

The group is known to have seized fighter jets from at least one air base it captured from the Syrian army in Raqqa province earlier this year. Militant websites had posted photos of IS fighters with the warplanes, but it was unclear if they were operational.

Abdurrahman said Islamic State members were being trained by Iraqi officers who had joined the group and who were once pilots under Saddam Hussein.

The Jarrah air base was captured by Islamic groups including al-Qaida’s Syrian branch, the Nusra Front, in early 2013. It was taken by Islamic State militants in January 2014.

Gen. Lloyd Austin, the top U.S. commander for the Middle East, said he has no operational reports of IS militants flying jets in support of their forces. Austin, the head of the U.S. Central Command who is directing the fight in Iraq and Syria, told Pentagon reporters he also has no information about Iraqi pilots defecting to IS.

An Iraqi intelligence official said the government is aware of several ex-Iraqi military officers going to Syria to train militants with the Islamic State group. He added the militants acquired warplanes from al-Tabaqa air base in Syria but did not get any when they toppled the Iraqi military in Mosul. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.

If IS fighters learn how to use such aircraft, they would become vulnerable to both Syrian and Iraqi MANPADS — man-portable-air-defense-systems — and coalition fighters, said Richard Brennan, an Iraq expert at RAND Corp. and former U.S. Defense Department policymaker.