Exporter.

This is coolbert:

The allied Syria–Lebanon Campaign of 1941 a model for the present-day allied coalition as arrayed in opposition to the Islamic State?

"The Syria–Lebanon campaign, also known as Operation Exporter, was the British invasion of Vichy French Syria and Lebanon from June–July 1941, during World War II".

1. Battle of Palmyra (1941).

"The Battle of Palmyra (1 July 1941) was part of the Allied invasion of Syria during the Syria-Lebanon campaign in World War II. British mechanized cavalry and an Arab Legion desert patrol broke up a Vichy French mobile column northeast of the city of Palmyra."

Map of the area circa 1941 showing roads [solid red line], tracks [dashed red line], pipelines [dashed blue line], railroads [solid black line] and allied military advance [dashed green line]. Click on image for enlarged view.

The track as shown on the map from Al Tanf westward to Damascus now paved? Access for the Iranian to move in an expeditious manner men and war munitions. A route to the Mediterranean.

2. Deir ez-Zor (1941).

"The Battle of Deir ez-Zor was part of the Allied invasion of Syria [Syria–Lebanon Campaign] during the Syria-Lebanon campaign in World War II."

PLACE NAMES AND LOCALES OF IMPORTANCE MORE OR LESS THE SAME IN 2017 AS WAS THE CASE IN 1941.

That route from the border crossing of Abu Kemal [a/k/a al-Bukamal] in a northwesterly direction through Mayadin, Deir-ez-Zor and Raqqa essential to the defeat of the Islamic State? American military historians and planners have studied the Syria–Lebanon Campaign as was waged in 1941 and have drawn the proper conclusions?

The British general officer Bill Slim as commanding  that element of  Exporter moving from Iraq into Syria with the mission of capturing Aleppo. British battlefield success in a sideshow of a sideshow, a backwater of a backwater but essential to morale boosting at a critical time.

coolbert.