U.S. military

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said on Sept. 28 that Washington would send more U.S. troops to help local forces in the battle to retake Mosul from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) expected later this year. 

U.S. President Barack Obama said April 25 that his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin was trying to undermine European unity, which he sees as a threat.

Speaking to CBS News in an interview set to air on April 26, Obama said Europe's migrant crisis was also a problem for the United States.

NATO and Russia begin their highest level talks for nearly two years on April 20, in a bid to ease military tensions over the Baltic Sea and the simmering violence still gripping eastern Ukraine.
 
The meeting of the NATO-Russia Council will be the first since Russia annexed Crimea in 2014, when the alliance cut off all practical ties with Moscow in protest.
 

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry visited Iraq on April 8 to show support for its prime minister, who is grappling with a political crisis, a collapsing economy and a fitful fight to retake ground from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants. 

Lockheed Martin Corp and the Pentagon missed their end-of-March target for reaching agreement on $15 billion in new F-35 fighter jets, but should complete work on the contracts in April, according to sources familiar with the matter.

"We're closer now than we were at the beginning of the month," said one of the sources, who was not authorized to speak publicly.

A fledgling U.S. base in northern Iraq came under attack again on March 21 from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and even drew a threat from an Iran-backed Shi'ite militia, two days after a U.S. Marine there was killed in a rocket attack. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin on March 17 declared his country's Syria mission a resounding success, but stressed Russia would continue to support the Syrian government and could build up its military presence in the region again within hours if necessary. 

Russia will complete the withdrawal of the bulk of its forces from Syria before the end of the week, a top Russian general suggested in an interview published on March 17.

Turkish military sources have denied reports that Turkey hit Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) positions in Tal Abyad across the border on Feb. 27 and 28.

Speaking to daily Hürriyet, military sources said neither YPG nor Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) positions on the Syrian side of the border have been targeted, refuting Russia's claims.

"The U.S. military believes that an airstrike against IS in Libya did not kill two kidnapped Serbian diplomats, as Belgrade has asserted," writes a U.S. daily.