DefenceTalkThe US-led international coalition battling to defeat the Islamic State group is not backing a drive by Turkish forces and Syrian rebels to retake a jihadist stronghold in northern Syria, the Pentagon said Wednesday. Their offensive on the city of Al-Bab is not being supported by coalition air strikes because it was “independently” launched by […]https://www.defencetalk.com/coalition-not-backing-turkish-move-on-al-bab-us-68594/

DefenceTalkThe United States is using Apache helicopters in the battle to retake Iraq’s second city of Mosul after more than two years of Islamic State group rule, the Pentagon said. The US military, backing the ground campaign by Iraqi forces, is directing the attack helicopters against explosives-packed vehicles the jihadist group is employing for suicide […]https://www.defencetalk.com/us-using-apache-helicopters-in-the-battle-for-mosul-68553/

DefenceTalkIraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on Tuesday warned Turkey against provoking a confrontation while saying he does not want war, after Ankara deployed tanks and artillery near the border. Turkey has insisted that it will play a role in the battle to retake Mosul from the Islamic State group, but Baghdad has rejected this assertion […]https://www.defencetalk.com/iraq-pm-warns-turkey-as-ankara-deploys-troops-68532/

DefenceTalkRussian President Vladimir Putin spoke by telephone with the leaders of Turkey and Iraq about battle for Mosul, where Iraqi forces are fighting to oust the Islamic State group, the Kremlin said Wednesday. Putin “wished the Iraqi army and its allies complete success in their objectives,” the Kremlin said in a statement on his conversations […]https://www.defencetalk.com/putin-in-talks-on-mosul-with-turkish-iraqi-leaders-kremlin-68432/

DefenceTalkEight Turkish soldiers were killed in a car bomb attack on a security post on Sunday blamed on Kurdish militants in the restive southeast, local media reported, quoting the armed forces. Five soldiers were also injured in the attack in the southeastern province of Hakkari close to the border with Iraq and Iran, CNN-Turk broadcaster […]https://www.defencetalk.com/eight-turkish-soldiers-killed-in-car-bombing-report-68347/

DefenceTalkTurkey is in the final stages of a developing a new missile defense system to prevent rocket attacks on its cities by the Islamic State, Turkey’s defense minister says. The system has been in the development process for the last 18 months and will be in the test phase this week before being deployed to […]https://www.defencetalk.com/turkey-tests-missile-defense-system-to-blunt-is-attacks-68278/

DefenceTalkSyria’s Aleppo faced worsening food and medical shortages and warplanes again pounded the city as Russia condemned what it called “unacceptable” Western rhetoric after allegations of war crimes. A fresh wave of intense air strikes battered Aleppo’s opposition-controlled east, said an AFP correspondent in the city facing its worst violence in years. During an emergency […]https://www.defencetalk.com/aleppo-battered-as-russia-slams-unacceptable-rhetoric-68222/

DefenceTalkTurkish warplanes have destroyed 10 Kurdish rebel positions in the restive southeast as Ankara steps up its fight against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), state media reported on Sunday. Jets bombed four PKK targets in the Cukurca district of the southeastern province of Hakkari close to northern Iraq on Saturday evening, security sources told […]https://www.defencetalk.com/turkish-jets-destroy-kurdish-rebel-targets-68090/

DefenceTalkGermany’s military is preparing to pull out from a Turkish airbase as a row between the two NATO partners escalates, Der Spiegel magazine reported Thursday. Germany in December agreed to send Tornado surveillance jets and tanker aircraft to the Incirlik base in southern Turkey to aid the multinational coalition fighting the jihadist Islamic State group […]https://www.defencetalk.com/germany-mulling-pullout-from-turkish-airbase-report-68060/

DefenceTalkTurkish armed forces on Monday launched artillery strikes on separate targets of Islamic State (IS) jihadists and the Democratic Union Party (PYD) Kurdish militia in northern Syria, television reports said. Turkish army howitzers stationed inside Turkey fired on IS targets in the town of Jarablus and PYD targets around the area of Manbij, the CNN-Turk […]https://www.defencetalk.com/turkey-launches-artillery-strikes-on-is-kurdish-pyd-in-north-syria-tv-68032/