Several Arab countries have offered to carry out airstrikes against militants from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, senior State Department officials said Sunday.
The offer was disclosed by American officials traveling with Secretary of State John Kerry, who is approaching the end of a week-long trip that was intended to mobilize international support for the campaign against ISIS.
?There have been offers both to Centcom and to the Iraqis of Arab countries taking more aggressive kinetic action,? said one of the officials, who used the acronym for the United States Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East.
Kerry, who is in Paris to attend an international conference the French are hosting on Monday on providing aid to the new Iraqi government, has already visited Baghdad; Amman, Jordan; Jidda, Saudi Arabia; Ankara, Turkey; and Cairo.
During Kerry?s stop in Jidda Thursday, 10 Arab countries joined the US in issuing a communiqu? that endorsed efforts to ultimately ?destroy? ISIS, including military action to which nations would contribute ?as appropriate.?
The US has a broad definition of what it would mean to contribute to the military campaign.
?Providing arms could be contributing to the military campaign,? said a second State Department official. ?Any sort of training activity would be contributing to the military campaign.?
President Fran?ois Hollande of France told Iraqi officials that his country would be willing to carry out airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq, senior Iraqi officials said.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott of Australia has also said his country will join the air campaign and is sending as many as eight FA-18 attack planes, as well as an early warning aircraft and a refueling plane.
The Australian aircraft will operate from the United Arab Emirates. Australia is also sending 200 troops, including commandos, to serve as advisers to Iraqi soldiers and the Kurdish peshmerga forces.
– MICHAEL R GORDON