Germany vows to obliterate ISIS as Berlin approves huge air and sea deployment
GERMANY’S Parliament approved plans the morning to provide military assistance in the fight against Islamic State militants, including Tornado reconnaissance jets, a battleship and 1,200 troops.
By Tom Batchelor
PUBLISHED: 10:37, Fri, Dec 4, 2015 | UPDATED: 12:12, Fri, Dec 4, 2015
MPs in Berlin voted 445 to 146 to approve the plan crafted by Chancellor Angela Merkel's Cabinet this week following a pledge of greater support in the wake of the deadly attacks in Paris, which ISIS - or Daesh - has claimed responsibility for.
Up to 1,200 troops will be sent to the region to tackle ISIS after Germany vowed a tougher response to the jihadi regime.
Germany plans to send up to six Tornado reconnaissance planes and tanker aircraft, which will provide aerial refuelling and satellite images rather than carrying out direct bombing missions.
But German equipment won't be actively engaged in any frontline combat activity.
Army chief of staff General Volker Wieker said on Sunday the military force would be mobilised “very quickly” once German MPs had given it the go-ahead.
Two German Tornados and a tanker are expected to be sent to Turkey's Incirlik air base next week but won't be fully operational until next month.
The frigate is also expected to be in place soon.
The mission will reportedly cost €134million (£96million) over the next year.
The country’s defence minister earlier ruled out any cooperation between German forces and President Bashar al-Assad or his troops.
Ursula von der Leyen said: "The top line is: there will be no cooperation with Assad and no cooperation with troops under his command.”
However, that did not exclude the possibility of including some of those currently on Assad's side in a long-term solution for the country, she said.
"We must avoid the collapse of the state of Syria but let me be clear - there will be no future with Assad.”
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, speaking to a newspaper last month, described the 1,200 soldiers as "an upper limit, with a buffer zone".
He told Bild: “Bombs and rockets alone will not conquer terror, that will only happen though politics.”
German troops in a guard of honourGETTY
Up to 1,200 German troops are to be deployed
Germany has seen a rise in extremist Islamists based in the country, with some estimates putting the number of ISIS sympathisers based there at 7,900, and fears have been heightened about the threat from jihadists since the shootings and bombings in France.
Since the Second World War, Germans have been reluctant to join military missions overseas and had previously resisted a direct involvement in Syria.
Britain joined air strikes against ISIS in Syria on Thursday after MPs backed military action by 397-223.
Tornado jets took off from the RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus before dawn on Thursday, just minutes after parliament voted in support of David Cameron’s plan to extend strikes from Iraq to Syria.
http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/624222/Islamic-State-German-MPs-back-plan-deploy-jets-frigate-troops-fight-ISIS
