Fifty US military experts are currently in Turkey accompanying the deployment of a High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) that was used against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Syria on Friday night, the Hürriyet daily reported.
HIMARS has been installed next to a Turkish missile defense system in Almalıtepe, Gaziantep province. The US missile system consists of two vehicles containing 30 launchers, the daily reported.
Rebels allied with Turkey on Sunday cleared terrorist ISIL elements from the last stretch of the Turkish border with Syria, the official Anadolu news agency reported, citing military sources.
It was hallmark progress in Turkey’s bid to secure the 90-kilometer (55 miles) corridor and marks a significant step in Ankara’s plan to stop the expansion of Kurdish militias towards the west.
With this, ISIL no longer controls any part of the border and has been removed from NATO’s southeastern frontier in an operation backed by Turkish tanks and troops.