Tri-Service

Fallon Urges Air Strikes In Syria

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon is to tell MPs that Britain must think again about using the RAF to conduct military air strikes against Islamic State targets in Syria.

Currently Tornados, flying from RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus, are only dropping bombs and missiles on IS - also known as Isil - sites in Iraq.

Mr Fallon however feels it is "illogical" that UK planes are able to hit the extremists in that country but not target their bases across the border.

If approval is sought from Parliament it's unlikely to happen until the election of a new Labour leader in September.

With the recent atrocity in Tunisia where at least 30 British people were massacred it's far more likely this time around that the opposition benches will support an expansion of what's known as Op Shader.

In 2013 the Prime Minister David Cameron failed to get his plan to target the forces of Bashar Assad - in the wake of the dictator's use of chemical weapons against rebels in Syria - through the Commons, instead only securing approval for the limited bombing of militant positions in Iraq.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's World At One, Mr Fallon was asked whether he thought British forces should have the scope to strike IS in Iraq, he said: "There is an illogicality about not being able to do it.

"There were reservations in the last parliament about doing anything in Syria that would prop up the Assad regime, which of course partly caused this problem in the first place.

"It is a new parliament and I think new Members of Parliament will want to think very carefully about how we best deal with Isil, and the illogicality of Isil not respecting the borderlines - they don't differentiate between Syria and Iraq, they are establishing this evil caliphate across both countries.

Fallon continued:

"There is no legal bar to us operating in Syria but we don't have the parliamentary approval for it.

"We don't need it at the moment because we are playing our part in the campaign, and indeed what we do in Iraq actually frees up the US to attack in Syria."

He added: "We have made it clear we would have to go back to Parliament, yes, and ask for parliamentary authority because we don't have that at the moment.

"The exception to that, as the Prime Minister has always made clear, is where we think there is an imminent threat, a very direct to British lives or for example to British hostages.

"Then we reserve the right to take action without prior parliamentary approval and then coming to account for it afterwards.

"Isil has to be defeated in both countries and all its evil in Iraq is all being directed by its headquarters in Syria."

Mr Fallon said efforts were under way to uncover links to the beach attack in Sousse.

"If we can link it back, if it does link directly back to Isil in Syria, then we will have to reflect with the rest of the coalition how best we deal with that," he said.

The Prime Minister's official spokeswoman said: "The Prime Minister has been clear on the need for us to be crushing Isil in both Iraq and Syria.

"Clearly, Isil is seeking to find areas from which it can operate, from where it can seek to threaten people here in Britain, and as part of what the PM was talking about in terms of having a 'full spectrum' response, that clearly means not just focusing on one area where they are, but looking at a whole range of areas and how Isil are operating."

The spokeswoman said "a lot has happened" since the chemical weapon attack by Assad which sparked the previous proposal for air strikes, "most recently 22 and likely more British citizens have been killed in a terrorist attack that the investigation so far suggests there are links to Isil".

She added: "Therefore the Prime Minister is clear that we absolutely should be thinking about, are we doing enough, and in the right areas, to tackle Isil."

In a keynote speech in London, meanwhile, Fallon said the next Defence Review would address the threat from IS, and insisted it would have ‘primacy’ over the treasury’s spending review.