Germany 'to Send Tornado Reconnaissance Jets' to Fight IS

W460

Germany plans to send Tornado reconnaissance jets to support the fight against the Islamic State group in Syria, the defense spokesman of Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives said Thursday.

A day after Merkel pledged in Paris to "very soon" decide how to help battle the IS group in Syria, she met cabinet ministers in charge of security ahead of afternoon meetings of the major parties' parliamentary groups.

"Germany will play a more active role than before," said the defense policy spokesman of her conservative CDU/CSU parliamentary group, Henning Otte, in a statement.

While the government had not yet issued a formal statement, Otte said Germany would go beyond its current arms shipments to and training of Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga forces combating the IS.

"We are not only strengthening the training mission in northern Iraq, but will step up our commitment in the fight against IS terror, among other things with RECCE reconnaissance Tornados," he said.

The aircraft fitted with surveillance technology can take high-resolution photos and infrared images, even at night and in bad weather, and transmit them in real time to ground stations.

Germany may also offer to support the anti-IS alliance with an aerial refueling aircraft, satellite images, and by sending a naval vessel to the Mediterranean, coalition sources told Agence France Presse.

The parliamentary groups of Merkel's conservatives as well as of her coalition partners, the center-left Social Democrats, were meeting in the afternoon to discuss how to support France in the battle against IS.

Post-war Germany has been traditionally reluctant to send troops abroad, although it has joined UN-mandated missions in the Balkans and elsewhere, and the NATO coalition in Afghanistan.

Germany has not taken part in air strikes against the IS in Syria and Iraq, which have been mainly flown by U.S. and French aircraft.

Otte said that "the IS can only be defeated militarily, therefore no idea must be ruled out as we engage in the fight against Islamist terrorism".

"Islamist terrorism is a threat to Germany and to world peace. Together with France and all other countries that oppose Islamist terror, we will provide everything necessary to the battle."

He added that all requests by the alliance against IS and by France "must be examined with an open mind".

Germany previously sent fighter aircraft for reconnaissance missions in the Balkans and in Afghanistan.

On Wednesday, Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen said Germany would deploy 650 more troops to Mali to relieve the France mission there.

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