Carter expects NATO endorsement of anti-IS campaign plan

U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter, who has been under pressure to shore up support from Sunni Arab allies to fight the Islamic State group, on Thursday welcomed a commitment from Saudi Arabia to expand its role in air strikes against the Sunni militants.

Carter offered few details on what the “tangible gains” might look like.

Coalition airstrikes helped Iraqi forces reacpture the Iraqi city of Ramadi in Anbar province late past year, creating a model for launching offensives in Mosul and Raqqa.

In all, 27 coalition members who have contributed militarily to the 18-month fight will join Carter’s delegation in Brussels.

In an earlier news conference, Carter said the Islamic State had to be defeated in Syria and Iraq and the cities of Mosul and Raqqa recaptured, “and our operational focus is on that”.

Carter said numerous countries recently answered his call for more resources, including Australia, Italy, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands and Canada. “But we are looking to enable them strongly and help them organise themselves”, he said.

Speaking for the group, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry hailed the results as a significant accomplishment but noted that a cessation-of-hostilities agreement, if it can be achieved, would only be a “pause” in fighting and that more work would need to be done to turn it into a fully-fledged cease-fire. Five years of civil war have pitted President Bashar Assad’s government, backed by Russian Federation and Iran, against an array of weakened opposition groups, some supported by the United States.

“Nobody wants to see Libya on a gliding slope to the situation now in Syria and Iraq”, Carter said.

“We are working with local forces in defeating ISIL [the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant]; we [will] also continue working with Turkey”, Carter said.

Defense Secretary Ash Carter, left, greets NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg as they meet at NATO headquarters in Brussels.

“Broad support” from coalition leaders marked the historic meeting, said the secretary said, adding that all agreed the counter-ISIL fight must be accelerated, requiring every coalition member nation to step up its efforts to contribute more to the effort.

He says U.S. Air Force Gen. Philip Breedlove, NATO’s supreme European commander, had ordered NATO Standing Maritime Group 2 deployed to the Aegean “without delay”.

A senior Russian diplomat says Moscow opposes plans to establish a “safe zone” along the Turkey-Syria border.

“The tensions are still very high, and there is no sense in provoking at this time”, Breedlove told reporters.

Asked wheher the Saudis and UAE were already operating in Syria, Carter said: “No. They’ve had kind of liaisons there…”

The three North Atlantic Treaty Organisation warships will provide “important information” to the Greek and Turkish coast guards and other authorities, Stoltenberg said.

The coalition, which comprises 66 nations, has since August 2014 been carrying out air strikes in Iraq and Syria to push back ISIS jihadists after they swept across vast parts of the two countries.