Vita huset: Vi stannar kvar och bekämpar IS i Syrien

The American-led intervention in the Syrian Civil War refers to US support of Syrian opposition and the Federation of Northern Syria during the course of the Syrian Civil War, and active involvement of US military against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and against the al-Nusra Front from 2014. Since 2017, US has also targeted Syrian military positions. The United States first supplied the rebels of the Free Syrian Army with non-lethal aid (including food rations and pickup trucks), but quickly began providing training, cash, and intelligence to selected Syrian rebel commanders. During the Syrian Civil War, which began in 2011, two US programs attempted to assist the Syrian rebels. One was a military program that planned to train and equip 15,000 Syrian rebels, but was canceled in 2015 after spending $500 million and producing only a few dozen fighters. A $1 billion covert program run by the CIA was more successful, but was decimated by Russian bombing and canceled in mid 2017 by the Trump administration. The United States began surveillance missions on Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) positions in Syria in September 2014. On 22 September 2014, the United States, Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates began to attack the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant forces inside Syria, as well as the Khorasan group in the Idlib Governorate to the west of Aleppo and the al-Nusra Front around Raqqa, as part of the military intervention against ISIL. The missile strike on the Shayrat Airbase conducted by the U.S. on 7 April 2017, was the first time the US has become a deliberate direct combatant against the Syrian government, and marked the start of a series deliberate direct military action by the U.S. military against the Syrian government′s and pro-government forces in May-June 2017 and February 2018. In mid-January 2018, the Trump administration indicated that it intended to maintain an open-ended military presence in Syria to counter Iran′s influence and oust Syrian president Bashar Assad.