Chinese warplanes join air strikes in Syria as Russia gains Iraqi air base
Russia’s military intervention in Syria has expanded radically in two directions. debkafile’s
military and intelligence sources report that China sent word to Moscow
Friday, Oct. 2, that J-15 fighter bombers would shortly join the
Russian air campaign that was launched Wednesday, Sept. 30. Baghdad has
moreover offered Moscow an air base for targeting the Islamic State now
occupying large swathes of Iraqi territory
Russia’s military intervention in Syria has five additional participants: China, Iran, Iraq, Syria and Hizballah.
The J-15 warplanes will take off from the Chinese Liaoning-CV-16 aircraft carrier, which reached Syrian shores on Sept. 26 (as debkafile exclusively reported at the time).
This will be a landmark event for Beijing: its first military operation
in the Middle East as well the carrier’s first taste of action in
conditions of real combat.
Thursday night, China’s foreign minister Wang Yi, made this comment
on the Syrian crisis at a UN Security Council session in New York: “The
world cannot afford to stand by and look on with folded arms, but must
also not arbitrarily interfere (in the crisis).”
