Jeff Davis

A Russian fighter jet flew within a little more than 3 meters (10 feet) of a U.S. Navy surveillance aircraft, in what American officials called an unsafe intercept over the Black Sea, the Pentagon said Sept. 7, although Moscow quickly insisted the encounter was within "international rules."

U.S. military commanders have been given the authority to target the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants in Afghanistan, the Pentagon said on Jan. 21, the first such order beyond Iraq and Syria, where the militants control parts of both countries.

U.S. military personnel rammed into the gate of a medical aid group's hospital in Afghanistan last week to enter the grounds of the building hit in a U.S. air strike earlier this month, a Pentagon spokesman said on Oct. 19.

The United States and Russia could soon sign a pact establishing safety protocols in the skies above Syria as both powers carry out separate bombing campaigns, a US defense official said on Oct. 14. 

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) fighters have regained territory in the contested city of Baiji, home to Iraq's largest oil refinery, the Pentagon said Sept. 2.

The U.S. military is expanding its combat role in Syria in defense of coalition-backed rebels, conducting armed drone missions into Syria from the ?ncirlik air base in Turkey. 

The first armed drone missions out of Turkey began last weekend, and the military is planning to add manned aircraft flights from there, U.S. officials have said.

A US-led coalition air strike earlier this month killed the leader of an Al-Qaeda offshoot in Syria that American officials accuse of plotting attacks against the United States and its allies, the Pentagon said.