In the ADF’s latest briefing on Australia’s Operation Okra, the Commander of Joint Operations, Vice-Admiral David Johnston, declined to detail precisely how many insurgent fighters had been killed or specifically how many air strikes had been involved.
But he said there had been casualties from “at least two” air strikes since the FA-18 Super Hornets began their work.
In their first strike, he said the jets had destroyed an IS facility and killed “a number” of the organisation’s fighters.
This week, two pairs of Australian Super Hornets dropped 500-pound bombs on military equipment and facilities in northern Iraq.
“Our indication is, from that attack, that they were also successful,” he said.
He indicated there had been no further use of what’s known as “the red card” – the legal power to refuse a task because it could jeopardise civilians or otherwise breach Australia’s rules of engagement – since the Hornets’ very first mission.
On that occasion, the decision not to proceed was taken in headquarters on the ground, based on pilots’ advice, not by the pilots themselves.
Operating in single or double pairs, the Super Hornets have made 43 individual flights – known as sorties - since they began operating over Iraq, involving more than 300 flying hours.
They have been called on for an increased number of missions over Iraq in the past week, to free up US and other countries’ forces to mount concerted attacks on IS forces in Syria, particularly around the town of Khobani.
But the situation in the threatened town near Syria’s border with Turkey remains precarious.
“It is fragile and it is uncertain,” he said. “The outcome is not clear in Khobani. There is some ground being made but it is a day by day proposition.”
Vice-Admiral Johnston said Australia was still awaiting the final legal approvals from Iraq for its Special Forces to begin their mission advising and assisting Iraqi forces.
“It’s not a military issue that I’m aware of,” he said. “I think it’s just taking time to work through the Iraqi system… I’m confident that we will get there and I’m confident that we will make a useful contribution.”
He hoped the issues would be resolved within days. In the meantime, their resources had been boosted with extra “protective mobility vehicles” to help safeguard their occupants from roadside and other bombs, once they are in the country.
Vice-Admiral Johnston said air strikes were having an effect, beyond just hitting the IS fighters’ military capability.
“They have a much broader impact around morale, the confidence and the notion of invincibility that ISIL fighters may have,” he said.
Strikes against other targets, including a mobile oil refinery, helped undermine IS revenue streams too.
Analysts have suggested the IS fighters may target Baghdad Airport to destroy a possible escape route for Iraqi civilians, warning this could cause panic and attempts to flee to the southern port city of Basra to flee by sea.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade reissued its travel advice overnight, urging Australians in Iraq to get out.
The military chief conceded that situation in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, remained “fragile”.
“The Baghdad environment has been fragile for some time,” Vice-Admiral Johnston said.
But he said Iraq had positioned “significant forces” on the ground to keep the city secure and the United States also had “capabilities”.
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