France calls for EU aid, but it’s an uphill war against IS

In private, though, French military analysts who spoke to The Indian Express have been questioning the sustainability of the country’s operations in the Middle East, saying lack of funding is straining their capacities to the limit and adding that unless specific numbers are put to the EU’s promise, their new campaign could run

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French military commanders also said this week’s highly publicised airstrikes on the Islamic State’s headquarters in Raqqa, targeting the alleged planners of the carnage in Paris, were of mainly symbolic value.

The multinational coalition against the Islamic State has been escalating air attacks for month, in support of Kurdish and Iraqi troops, with up to 2,670 bombs and missiles released, according to the United States Central Command. These figures do not include large-scale Russian air strikes against the IS and other jihadist groups in Syria.

French jets, including six Rafales flying from the United Arab Emirates, and three Mirage 2000Ds and three Mirage 2000Ns based in Jordan, have been bombing targets in Iraq and Syria for months. Since July, no less than 2,000 weapons have been released on the Islamic State each month. The new French strikes were reported to have delivered 20 bombs each day.

However, France has also quietly deployed ground troops in training roles, training Iraqi and Kurdish forces over the past year. The army is considering making more forces available for special forces operations against key targets. It could send weapons to allies, such as M-2 machine guns already provided to the Kurdish Peshmerga.

Intelligence analysts involved in planning for the operations say the real problem is identifying targets, given the absence of troops in contact with Islamic State forces on the ground. In addition, the Islamic State has abandoned fixed positions and takes to operating mainly at night

French commanders are used to operating with limited resources. Its highly skilled expeditionary units are “general-purpose forces with a long-standing expeditionary mission and outlook” that have eschewed the errors of United States tactics in Afghanistan and Iraq, the expert Michael Shurkin has written.

Earlier this week, Hollande met with his top security advisers to downscale a five-year programme of military budget cuts, announcing it would slash 18,300 positions through 2019, instead of the initially planned 25,800.

Long before the attacks this month in Paris, the cost-cutting French government had approved the military job cuts as a way to reduce an expanding budget deficit.

The French military is increasingly stretched, with anti-jihadist and regional stabilisation operations leading to the commitment of 10,000 in Africa. In addition, about 1,500 are deployed in West Asia, while there has been a 10,000-troop homeland deployment since the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January.

Hollande said the defence budget in 2015 would remain at 31.4 billion euros, but added that an extra 3.8 billion euros would be needed to finance equipment purchases through 2016-2019.

European Union member states have offered to relieve France of parts of its burden in counterterrorism operations in North Africa, which could free up capacities to be used against the Islamic State or internally. The details of these offers, though, have not yet become available.

British Prime Minister David Cameron has been calling for the United Kingdom to join airstrikes on the Islamic State in Syria, but has not found backing from MPs, including within his own party.