U.S. May Begin Airstrikes Against ISIS In Philippines

The Pentagon is considering a plan that allows the U.S. military to conduct airstrikes on ISIS in the Philippines, two defense officials says.

According to NBCnews, the authority to strike ISIS targets as part of collective self-defense could be granted as part of an official military operation that may be named as early as Tuesday, said the officials. The strikes would likely be conducted by armed drones.


U.S. military has been sharing intelligence with the Philippines for years, according to Pentagon spokesperson Capt. Jeff Davis, who called it a "steady state."
"We have had a consistent CT (counter terror) presence in the Philippines for fifteen years now," he said.


There is a small U.S. military presence on the ground supporting the counter-ISIS fight, called Joint Special Operations Task Force Trident.


In Manila on Monday, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the U.S. was providing the Philippines government with "intelligence capabilities" in the fight against ISIS, including "some recent transfers of a couple of Cessnas and a couple of UAVs (drones) to allow to them to have better information with which to conduct the fight down there."

"We're providing them some training and some guidance in terms of how to deal with an enemy that fights in ways that are not like most people have ever had to deal with.

"I see no conflict at all in our helping them with that situation and our views of other human rights concerns we have with respect to how they carry out their counter narcotics activities."

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have linked Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte to more than 1,400 extra judicial killings while a public official. The UN said that Duterte, as mayor of Davao City, had done nothing to stop extrajudicial killings.

Duterte has denied any role in the killings, while expressing support for them  but has also said he personally killed some suspected criminals, a claim his spoke man called an exaggeration.

Last month, the vice chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs endorsed the idea of naming the mission in the Philippines, saying that naming it would provide more funding.