On Friday, lawmakers in Germany voted in favor of Chancellor Angela Merkel's plan to join the coalition of nations that are fighting ISIS in Syria.
Reporting for NPR, Esme Nicholson says Germany will send six Tornado jets, a naval frigate and up to 1,200 soldiers to fight ISIS in Syria. The country, however, will not participate in airstrikes.
As The New York Times explains, the move comes after requests from France to assist in battling ISIS in the aftermath of the Nov. 13 terrorist attacks that killed 130 people in Paris.
The vote was 445-146, with seven abstentions, in favor of military support, the Times reports:
"Twenty-eight Social Democrats and just two Christian Democrats joined the opposition — the Greens and the Left party — in opposing the deployment. Three Greens voted for the military action.
"Even 70 years after World War II, Germany remains wary of using its military outside the NATO alliance, and such missions require parliamentary approval."
Germany and France aren't the only European countries boosting their military involvement in the Syria campaign. As the Two-Way reported, British Prime Minister David Cameron won parliamentary support to expand Britain's air campaign against ISIS on Wednesday. The U.K. already participates in the campaign against Islamic State militants in Iraq. Now it will conduct strikes in Syria as well.
Germany's move, as The Washington Post notes, stands in contrast to Merkel's refusal in 2011 to deploy German military forces to aid in the ouster of Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi. Since World War II, Germany has been cautious about deploying its military force outside of the NATO alliance.
Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.
