Last night France conducted its first air-strike within Syria as part of Combined Joint Task Force: Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTFOIR) - the US-led coalition against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
No details have been provided of the type of target that was struck but you suspect that doesn't really matter in a bizarre French move that seems to make little strategic sense.
As I've said repeatedly when France, Australia and the UK first suggested expanding their air operations into Syria the problem is not that there is a lack of air power. In fact the number of aircraft available to CJTFOIR to carry out strikes has always far exceeded the number of targets to strike in Syria.
For example on September 16th (16/9/15) CJTFOIR carried out just three air-strikes in Syria. The day before (15/9/15) they also carried out just three air-strikes. September 14th (14/9/15) was a comparatively busy day with CJTFOIR carrying out a full four air-strikes in Syria.
With CJTFOIR continuing to block me on Twitter and them being slow to update their website I am struggling to find out the daily total of air-strikes. However I gather that on Friday (25/9/15) CJTFOIR carried out just a single air-strike in Syria.
The reason for this massive collapse in the intensity of in anti-ISIL operations is really twofold. Firstly CJTFOIR has been conducting strategic bombing of ISIL for more then a year now. This has not caused ISIL to collapse and as a result unless it is going to move to providing close air-support to a ground force CJTFOIR has more or less run out of targets to bomb.
The second much more serious problem is the deal between US President Barack Obama and Turkish President/Prime Minister/Emperor Recep Tayyip Erdogan which saw Turkey conduct operations as part of CJTFOIR and allowed US aircraft to use United States Air Force (USAF) base Incirlik in Turkey. The condition of this agreement is that CJTFOIR is no longer allowed to conduct operations in support of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG).
As the US' disastrous attempts to put Sunni-Arab insurgents into Syria over the past week have shown the YPG are not only the only effective anti-ISIL force in Syria they are really the only anti-ISIL force in Syria. As such this agreement with Turkey is only serving to protect ISIL by preventing CJTFOIR from taking any action to defeat them.
With this ludicrous situation where CJTFOIR aircraft are allowed to fly over ISIL positions in Syria but not attack them you would think that any CJTFOIR that was committed to defeating ISIL would be exerting pressure on the US to re-negotiate this agreement with Turkey. This would be done by making it quite clear that no-one is getting any further involved in the operation until the US devises a viable plan to make the operation a success.
By launching air-strikes in Syria France has completely abandoned that position and voted firmly for preserving the status quo.
Although France has yet to issue a statement providing clarity on the issue over recent weeks French President Francois Hollande has indicated that he would invoke "Self-Defence" as the justification for any such strikes.
Hollande was really elected as an alternative to the gung-ho interventionist policies of his predecessor Nicholas Sarkozy who led military action against Libya. As such to a domestic political audience it is likely to be seen as important to Hollande to make the entirely valid point that he is spending all this money and putting French lives in danger to protect French civilians from terrorist attack. As host of the COP21 Climate Change Summit France has been at particularly high risk of terrorist attack.
However if France is to use "Self-Defence" as its actual legal justification for military action this will mean invoking Article 51 of the United Nations (UN) Charter. As I've explained before this is not possible because Article 51 only allows for military action until the UN Security Council (UNSC) can meet to address the issue. On the issue of ISIL the UNSC has already met and passed resolution 2170 (2014) authorising military force against both ISIL and Al Qaeda's Syrian affiliate Al Nusra Front (ANF).
So as with UK Prime Minister David Cameron's recent drone strikes this is another case of the action being entirely legal but not for the reason the person in charge thinks it is.
If France does not consider 2170 sufficient authority for strikes in Syria it forces us to question whether Francein fact wishes to provide support to ANF which is prohibited by 2170 or conduct strikes against the Syrian government. As the Syrian government is fighting both ISIL and ANF this would be a violation by France of both 2170 and the UN charter.
Article 51 is also what Turkey has invoked to justify its attacks on Kurdish forces - particularly in Iraq. France also unilaterally invoking Article 51 would strengthen Turkey's position encouraging them to carry out more strikes when really they should be encouraged to stop.
The timing of this French move is particularly odd because with the Russian military build-up in Syria I was going to say that we seem to be approaching the point where Russia takes over the fight against ISIL in Syria while CJTFOIR is left to focus on the far simpler task of merely pushing ISIL out of Iraq and back into Syria.
However today it has been confirmed that Russia and Iraq have agreed a joint operations centre in Iraq dedicated to fighting ISIL. As such we actually seem to be at the point where Russia takes on the role of defeating ISIL while the CJTFOIR nations howl in protest and continue to impose sanctions on Russia for daring to oppose ISIL.
In the statement issued in support of last night strikes France spoke of them being a symbol of the nations "resolute commitment to fight." As such rather then being an attempt to defeat ISIL the French strikes seem to be a sign of support for ISIL by showing that France will resist Russian, Syrian and Iraqi efforts to defeat ISIL.
Yesterday I spoke of a UN brokered ceasefire that would see the Army of Conquest/Jaish al-Fatah (JAF) coalition - which is headed by ANF and the Islamic Movement of the Freemen of the Levant/Harakat Ahrar ash-Sham al-Islamiyya (FML/Ahrar ash-Sham) - free some 10,000 civilian hostages from the villages of Fuaa and Kafraya on the Idlib/Latakia front-line and allow them to take refugee in Syrian government controlled territory.
It appears that this ceasefire that was intended to last for six months has already collapsed.
The problems began yesterday when the International Committee of the Red Cross/Crescent (ICRC) arrived to evacuate the civilians from Fuaa and Kafraya. They were immediately mobbed by residents of the near-by town of Saraqeb who also wished to be evacuated. Then JAF moved in to stop any refugees being evacuated.
Today JAF have resumed their shelling of Syria government positions.
12:55 on 27/9/15 (UK date).
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