European countries join fight

Associated Press

BEIRUT

American warplanes and drones hit Islamic State group tanks, Humvees, checkpoints and bunkers in airstrikes Friday targeting the extremists in Syria and Iraq, as the U.S.-led coalition expanded to include Britain, Denmark and Belgium.

The European countries committed to take part only in the Iraq part of the military campaign, leaving the operation in Syria to the United States and five Arab allies who began conducting airstrikes there Tuesday. Still, the broadening of the coalition provides a welcome boost for President Barack Obama and the American-led campaign.

The U.S.-led operation aims to roll back and ultimately crush the Islamic State group, which has carved out a proto-state stretching from Syria’s northern border with Turkey to the outskirts of Baghdad. The militants have employed brute force to achieve their goals, massacring captured Syrian and Iraqi troops, terrorizing minorities in both countries and beheading two American journalists and a British aid worker.

While striking fear into its opponents, the Islamic State group’s tactics also have helped galvanize the international community to move against the extremists. France already has joined the U.S.-led effort in Iraq and is considering expanding its role to Syria as well. The Netherlands, too, has said it would take part in the bombing campaign in Iraq.

Denmark, Belgium and Britain all signed on as well Friday. Denmark said it would send seven F-16 fighter jets and 250 pilots and support staff, while Belgium will contribute six F-16s that already are en route to Jordan so they can go into action as early as today.

“No one should be ducking in this case,” said Danish Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt. “Everyone should contribute.”

British lawmakers also voted Friday to join the coalition. London is expected to deploy Tornado fighters, which are in Cyprus — within striking distance of northern Iraq.

“This is about psychopathic terrorists that are trying to kill us, and we do have to realize that, whether we like it or not, they have already declared war on us,” Prime Minister David Cameron told a tense House of Commons in a more than six-hour debate. “There isn’t a ‘walk-on-by’ option. There isn’t an option of just hoping this will go away.”

The European contingent will join a campaign that already has carried out hundreds of airstrikes, the latest of which hit Islamic State positions in both Iraq and Syria late Thursday and Friday.

The U.S. Central Command said that airstrikes outside the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk destroyed three Islamic State Humvees, disabled two armed vehicles and damaged an armored truck. More strikes west of Baghdad and near the Syrian border knocked out a guard shack, armed vehicles, a bunker and a checkpoint.

In Syria, the U.S. destroyed four tanks and damaged another outside the city of Deir el-Zour on the Euphrates River.

Those strikes marked the second-consecutive day that the United States and its Arab allies have taken aim at the militants near the border with Iraq.