US commander skeptical of cooperation with Russia in Syria

The close encounter highlights how crowded the airspace and battlefield have become in the five-year-old civil war in Syria, where both USA and Russian forces are launching strikes with competing interests.

A top U.S. commander has warned Russian Federation and Syria he will defend United States special operations forces in northern Syria if the country’s regime attacks again areas where troops are located.

In a telephone interview from Baghdad, new Iraq-Syria War Commander Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend tried to echo the boundless optimism of every other USA commander when put in charge of one of the nation’s various open-ended wars, vowing to see all of ISIS dead, and virtually ousted from both countries within a year.

Townsend is the first senior military commander to speak on the record about the U.S. possibly challenging the Syrian Air Force in the wake of an incident just days ago.

The U.S. has teamed with rebels to target militants affiliated with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, and has called for the removal of Syrian President of Bashar al-Assad, while Russian supports the regime.

Townsend then added that the Russians “tell us they’ve informed the Syrians, and I’d just say that we will defend ourselves if we feel threatened”.

Several American troops had to be evacuated and now Washington has stepped up jet patrols in northern Syria to stop it happening again.

When asked how he would define the defeat of ISIS, the general said it would be when the so-called caliphate no longer exists and does not control significant population centers.

As many as 300 U.S. troops are stationed near the city, training and advising the Kurdish YPG militia in its fight against the Islamist State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil).

“I don’t want to make promises, but I intend to have Mosul and Raqqa done on my watch”, Townsend told Stars and Stripes, making a hefty promise for only a year’s stint.

Once Mosul and Raqqa are in the bag, Townsend thinks what’s left of ISIS will “have to crawl into holes and little villages int he desert and hide” at which point the terror group will transform into an insurgency.