Kirk Wants More Air Strikes On ISIS Targets In Iraq And Syria

CHICAGO (CBS) -- U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk on Thursday said he is disappointed with the level of U.S.-led airstrikes against ISIS terrorists in the Middle East.

WBBM Newsradio Political Editor Craig Dellimore reports the Republican senator from Illinois said he believes the U.S. and its coalition partners should be making many more airstrikes against militants with the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.

He said the level of bombings seen in Operation Desert Storm would do more damage than the relative handful of missions now underway in Syria and Iraq.

"Right now, the president has only authorized about an average of five sorties a day. To compare it to Destert Storm, that was about 2,000 sorties a day," Kirk said.

However, Kirk said the Obama administration has been doing the right thing by targeting oil refineries seized by ISIS extremists.

"Right now ISIS' main source of income is illegal oil sales, about $2 million a day. We ought to be hitting the pipelines and roads where ISIS can get its oil out for sale to make sure that $2 million a day that ISIS is earning is a lot less," he said.

In addition to oil facilities controlled by ISIS, American-led coalition warplanes attacked the militants themselves.

U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), which is in control of all military operations in the region, said a total of 10 strikes by American aircraft hit ISIS targets in both Iraq and Syria between Thursday and Friday morning.

In Syria, CENTCOM said three strikes south and southeast of Deir Ezzor destroyed four ISIS tanks and damaged a fifth. The missiles fired on the Iraqi side of the border also focused on removing from the battlefield some of the many military vehicles and tanks -- mostly stolen from Iraqi forces during ISIS' rampage across northern Iraq earlier this summer.

In western Iraq, near the Syrian border, an airstrike "destroyed four ISIL armed vehicles, a command and control node and a checkpoint," said CENTCOM, referring to the militant group by an alternate acronym.

In total, the strikes overnight destroyed or damaged at least 16 military vehicles in ISIS possession.

The U.S.-led coalition, which began its aerial campaign against ISIS in Syria early Tuesday, aims to roll back and ultimately crush the extremist group that has created a proto-state spanning the Syria-Iraq border. Along the way, the militants have massacred captured Syrian and Iraqi troops, terrorized minorities in both countries and beheaded two American journalists and a British aid worker.

The air assault has taken aim at ISIS checkpoints, training grounds, oil fields, vehicles and bases as well as buildings used as headquarters and offices.
Activists say the militants have cut back the number of gunmen manning checkpoints, apparently fearing more strikes. There has also been an exodus of civilians from ISIS strongholds.