BAGHDAD - The United States has bombed militants near Baghdad in support of Iraqi forces, striking close to the capital for the first time in its expanded campaign against Islamic State militants.
But in a sign of their growing strength, a monitoring group said the militants had managed to bring down a Syrian warplane conducting strikes over their stronghold of Raqa in north-central Syria.
The US air strike against IS fighters in the Sadr al-Yusufiyah area, 25 kilometres from Baghdad, came as world diplomats pledged to support Iraq in its fight against the militants and less than a week after US President Barack Obama ordered a “relentless” war against IS.
“US military forces continued to attack (IS) terrorists in Iraq, employing attack and fighter aircraft to conduct two air strikes Sunday and Monday in support of Iraqi security forces near Sinjar and southwest of Baghdad,” the US Central Command said in a statement.
“The air strike southwest of Baghdad was the first strike taken as part of our expanded efforts beyond protecting our own people and humanitarian missions to hit (IS) targets as Iraqi forces go on offence, as outlined in the president’s speech last Wednesday.” The American military’s top-ranking officer told senators on Tuesday President Barack Obama will consider sending US military advisers into combat in Iraq on a “case by case basis.”
General Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said future battles in Iraq could require American troops to join combat missions with Baghdad government forces to help direct American warplanes.
US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said the military plan would be outlined to Obama on Wednesday by the US Central Command. It envisions striking the militant group’s safe havens to knock out infrastructure, logistics and command capabilities. Dempsey said the strikes would degrade the group’s capabilities as broader efforts get underway, including training of some 5,400 Syrian fighters in Saudi Arabia. Congress is expected to approve this week a request from Obama for $500 million to arm and train moderate Syrian rebels, one part of his programme.
 ‘This won’t look like a ‘shock and awe’ campaign because that’s simply not how (the Islamic State group) is organized. But it will be a persistent and sustainable campaign,’ Dempsey told the Senate Armed Services Committee.
‘Shock and awe’ was a term popularly used to describe the initial air assault on Baghdad in the U.S. campaign to oust Saddam Hussein in 2003, and refers to use of overwhelming force to undermine an enemy’s will to fight. Still, Hagel acknowledged the number of Syrian fighters that could be trained over the course of the year would only put the opposition on the path to roll back Islamic State fighters. ‘Five thousand alone is not going to be able to turn the tide. We recognize that,’ Hagel said.
The Senate hearing was repeatedly interrupted by anti-war protesters, shouting slogans such as, ‘There is no military solution.’ One protester was escorted out of the room while holding a sign that read: ‘More war = More extremism.’ Senator Angus King of Maine, expressing concern that the United States would be drawn into interminable fights against extremist groups around the world from Iraq to Syria to Africa. said: ‘This is geopolitical Wack-a-mole.’
The Syrian government and mainstream opposition must seek compromise to end three and half years of bloody civil war and block the rise of murderous militants, UN investigators said Tuesday.
“The rise of (Islamic State fighters) has emphasised the need for the government and mainstream opposition to find common ground and to commit to making compromises,” said Paulo Pinheiro, who heads the United Nation’s Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in Syria.

Dempsey indicated he had discussed the possibility with the US president, who has so far emphatically ruled out sending any ground troops into combat. “He (Obama) told me to come back to him on a case by case basis,” the four-star general said.
The strikes destroyed six IS vehicles near Sinjar and an IS position southwest of Baghdad that had been firing on Iraqi forces.
A senior US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, warned that US forces will target Syrian anti-aircraft systems if they take aim at American planes conducting strikes inside Syria against IS.
Iraqi security spokesman Lieutenant General Qassem Atta on Tuesday welcomed the expanded American action, saying the US “carried out an important strike against an enemy target in Sadr al-Yusufiyah.”
Sadr al-Yusufiyah lies in the Euphrates Valley, between the militant stronghold of Fallujah, west of Baghdad, and the key battleground of Jurf al-Sakhr, further south. It is one of the closest front lines to Baghdad where Iraqi government forces and allied militia have struggled to defend their positions.
As part of the extended campaign Washington has vowed to carry out strikes in Syria as well, despite warnings from President Bashar al-Assad’s regime against violating its airspace.
On Tuesday, the militants shot down a Syrian warplane conducting strikes against them, the first time they have done so since the regime began bombing their stronghold of Raqa in July, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
“IS fighters fired on a military aircraft which crashed,” the Britain-based monitoring group said.
“It is the first aircraft shot down since the regime launched air strikes against the militants in July following their declaration of a caliphate in late June,” said the group, which relies on a wide network of doctors and activists for reports on the situation in Syria.
A photograph posted on a militant Twitter account purported to show the wreckage of the plane.
“God is the Greatest), thanks to God we can confirm that a military aircraft has been shot down over Raqa,” another account said, congratulating the “lions of the Islamic State”.
The expansion of the US air campaign came as representatives from about 30 countries and international organisations, including the United States, Russia and China, vowed during talks in Paris on Monday to support Iraq in the fight against IS.
In a joint statement, diplomats promised to back Baghdad “by any means necessary, including appropriate military assistance, in line with the needs expressed by the Iraqi authorities, in accordance with international law and without jeopardising civilian security.”
They stressed that IS militants are “a threat not only to Iraq but also to the entire international community” and underscored the “urgent need” to remove them from Iraq.
The Paris statement made no mention of Syria, but US Secretary of State John Kerry stressed again at the talks that “we’re not going to coordinate with the Syrians.”


On the ground in Iraq, sporadic clashes broke out Monday near the town of Dhuluiyah, north of Baghdad, where security forces and allied tribesmen prepared for an operation against IS-led militants.
The area would appear to be the target of the next major drive against IS in Iraq, after a successful operation to break the siege of the town of Amerli farther north.
The Paris meeting was the latest in a series of frantic diplomatic efforts to build a broad global coalition against the militants, and German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said meetings would come “thick and fast” ahead of a UN General Assembly next week.
Ten Arab states including Saudi Arabia are among the countries backing the US-led coalition, and Australia has pledged 600 troops.
“We are not building a military coalition for an invasion... but for a transformation as well as for the elimination of (IS),” Kerry told reporters. “We are fighting an ideology, not a regime.”
The beheading at the weekend of a British aid worker, the third Western hostage to be executed on camera, raised the stakes in the battle against the militants, who the CIA estimates have as many as 31,500 fighters.