It was the first time the U.S. has mounted airstrikes in Syria.

It was the first time the U.S. sent its most advanced fighter jet, the F-22 Raptor, into combat.

It was the first time the U.S. military targeted the Khorasan group, a little-known terrorist cell that is potentially more threatening than the Islamic State militants who now control large swaths of Iraq and Syria.

And it was the largest coalition of Arab militaries joining an American-led operation since the 1991 Gulf War in Iraq.

Monday night's massive air assault hitting 22 targets across Syria was a historic operation that signals a new expansion of a war that is likely to last for years.

U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps aircraft dropped precision-guided missiles on two separate and distinct extremists groups, targeting command-and-control headquarters, barracks, training camps logistical nodes and other sites, defense officials said.

"You are seeing the beginning of a sustained campaign," Army Lt. Gen. William Mayville, the Joint Staff's director of operations, told Pentagon reporters Tuesday.

Asked about the duration of this campaign, he said: "I would think of it in terms of years."

Monday night's attacks involved about 200 munitions, a defense official said, making it far more intense than the air campaign over Iraq that began Aug. 8, which have rarely targeted more than one or two sites at a time.

It's unclear whether the operation, which has no formal name, will keep up the same pace. "The tempo of this thing will be dictated by the facts on the ground and ... it's driven by the opportunities that we see," Mayville said.

He noted the challenge of mounting airstrikes without a small team of U.S. troops on the ground to help identify accurate targeting information. However, he said, those troops, typically known as joint tactical air controllers, or JTACs, are not necessary.

"There are other ways to deliver precise munitions than putting a JTAC forward. … There's obviously a desire to put something on the ground. But we don't always have to strike with JTACs forward."

"We've been doing this very successfully thus far. … We've been able to provide air support without putting forces forward, and I think we will continue to look at how we can do that as we move forward," Mayville said.

Mayville reiterated the longstanding policy of keeping U.S. boots off the ground. "We have not put, and we will not put, ground forces into Syria," Mayville said.

F-22 sees action

Monday night's air attack was the first real-world combat mission for the F-22, the Air Force's most capable air-superiority fighter that entered service in 2005. The F-22 has sophisticated radar-evading capabilities and can drop bombs from a greater distance than other military aircraft.

Use of the F-22 may reflect high-level concerns about Syria's formidable air defense systems. Yet Mayville said U.S. intelligence aircraft found the Syrian air defense system in a "passive" mode during Monday night's operations, meaning the Syrian military was monitoring the U.S. aircraft but not using its radar for targeting purposes and threatening to use anti-aircraft weaponry.

The assault occurred in three waves, with the first beginning at 8 p.m. Eastern time (before dawn Tuesday in Syria). More than 40 Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles were launched from two Navy ships, the destroyer Arleigh Burke and the guided-missile cruiser Philippine Sea. The missiles hit extremists linked to the Khorasan group, a little-known al-Qaida offshoot that has established a safe haven in eastern Syria.

Striking the Khorosan group was intended "to disrupt the imminent attack plotting against the United States and Western interests conducted by a network of seasoned al-Qaida veterans," according to a statement from U.S. Central Command. The missiles hit some training camps and improvised explosive device "manufacturing workshops."

The group has been "actively recruiting westerners to serve as operatives and go back and blend into their own countries," one senior administration official said Tuesday.

A second wave of airstrikes targeted Islamic State militants. It involved F-22s, F-16 Fighting Falcons, F-15 Strike Eagles, B-1 bombers and unmanned aircraft. Those aircraft likely flew from Air Force bases in the U.S. Central Command region.

The third wave began about midnight Eastern standard time and featured Navy and Marine Corps F/A-18 Super Hornets flying from the carrier George H.W. Bush, which is in the Persian Gulf. Those aircraft hit Islamic State targets near the border with Iraq's Anbar province, including a training camp.

The U.S. did not coordinate with the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, whom the U.S. government opposes. But Mayville did acknowledge that the U.S. government notified the Syrian government about the strikes beforehand.

President Obama spoke from the White House on Tuesday morning and highlighted the participation of several Arab allies, including Jordan, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. While the UAE participated in the 2011 American-led operations in Libya, Monday's coalition is the largest group of Middle Eastern militaries since the alliance the U.S. led in 1991 against Iraqi forces in Kuwait.

Their participation was a diplomatic victory for Obama, who has strenuously sought to prevent the perception that America is operating alone.

"The strength of this coalition makes it clear to the world that this is not America's fight alone. Above all, the people and governments in the Middle East are rejecting ISIL and standing up for the peace and security that the people of the region and the world deserve," Obama said Tuesday, using one of the Islamic State's variant acronyms.

The coalition's participation was limited to the strikes on the Islamic State militants; the strikes against the Khorasan group involved only U.S. aircraft.

It remains unclear the extent of the operational role that the allied militaries played. Mayville acknowledged that U.S. aircraft delivered the "preponderance of force."

About Andrew Tilghman

Andrew Tilghman is the executive editor for Military Times. He is a former Military Times Pentagon reporter and served as a Middle East correspondent for the Stars and Stripes. Before covering the military, he worked as a reporter for the Houston Chronicle in Texas, the Albany Times Union in New York and The Associated Press in Milwaukee.

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