Posted on 08/21/2015 8:40:17 AM PDT by naturalman1975
THE United States has formally asked Australia to extend its air combat operations to hit Islamic State targets in Syria, but the government won't be rushing to make a decision.
PRIME Minister Tony Abbott said it was a serious request and a response would be made in the next couple of weeks. He warned consolidation of a terrorist state in Eastern Syria and northern Iraq would be a catastrophe for the world.
"It would be a disaster for Australia because what we have been seeing on an almost daily basis is the continued lure that this terrorist group, that this incipient terrorist state, is providing to misguided and impressionable young Australians," he told reporters in Perth on Friday.
Mr Abbott said as a courtesy he had advised Opposition Leader Bill Shorten of the request from the Pentagon. Labor will be formally briefed next week.
Australia dispatched an air task group to the Middle East in 2014, with the first combat mission flown on October 6.
The group now comprises six F/A-18 Hornets, an E-7A Wedgetail airborne early warning and control aircraft and a KC-30A airborne refueller, which fly from a pair of bases in the United Arab Emirates.
Australian aircraft operate up to the Iraq-Syria border but don't intrude into Syrian airspace, although Wedgetail and KC-30A aircraft support other coalition aircraft which do fly into Syria.
Mr Abbott said Daesh (Islamic State) was a movement of "almost incalculable unfathomable evil" and it was important that Australia play a part in disrupting, degrading and ultimately destroying this "death cult".
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.au ...
Barak inviting some more honkies to take out his garbage.
It’s a trap. Obama doesn’t want to defeat ISIS. He just wants to show token opposition for public consumption and this request will cause trouble for the conservative Australian government which Obama would like to change - IMO.
Austria? Australia? Austin?.................
Dear Oz, youre smart enough to see through this BS.
I would be leery of aligning with the US at this hour .... it will be reported as aligning with obozo and good people CERTAINLY do not want THAT association.
After Oblamo and and any other Progressive POTUS, I would welcome Australia, the UK, Canada, and all other traditional US allies in an all-out assault to utterly destroy the evil Islamic death cult, ISIS.
fAust
Faust & Furrious?...................
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