The Russians and Syrians have expressed outrage over an air strike by a coalition force - including Australia - that killed Syrian soldiers.

The caller advised that coalition jets were about to strike the Islamic State near the city of Deir ez-Zor, in eastern Syria. It was both a courtesy call and a safety measure to ensure coalition fighters didn’t get tangled with Russian jets prowling the airspace.

The Russians either did not pass that message on to their Syrian ground allies near the Deir ez-Zor military airfield or, if they did, may not have had the coordinates of the impending strike. When the Russians called CAOC back, advising that coalition jets were killing Syrian troops, it was already too late.

Some 60-80 Syrian troops loyal to President Bashar al-Assad were mistaken for ISIS and blasted out of existence.

Australia has some 30 ADF and intelligence operatives working in CAOC. Though they work strategies across the whole air-war effort, and are not limited to monitoring only RAAF aircraft, they would have taken special interest in this strike, which involved Australian jets.

Syrian government buses evacuate residents from Al-Waer, the last rebel-held neighbourhood of Homs, Syria.Source:AP

The majority of Australian missions have been over Iraq, where since September 2014 our fighters have flown about 1700 missions and dropped more than 1300 precision-guided bombs. By comparison, the RAAF has flown just 45 missions over Syria and dropped around 50 bombs.

The Syrian sorties are potentially more dangerous than Iraq, because of the multitude of unfriendly factions in the battlefield and the higher chance they could be hit with anti-aircraft guns.

Added to that, the chances of rescuing a downed fighter pilot in Iraq are better than Syria, where there are almost no allies on the ground. Syrian bombing expeditions are watched a little more anxiously.

The Russians and Syrians expressed outrage over the strike, accusing the US-led coalition of deliberately killing Syrian soldiers in order to assist the Islamic State: an irrational claim designed purely to stir dissent.

The Syrians, who barrel-bomb their own citizens to death from helicopters, have no credibility on such matters. Nor do the Russians who, fighting in support of Assad, have used their jets to crush hospitals and quiet suburbs.

Two days after the Syrians were killed, Russia was accused of bombing a United Nations aid convoy near Aleppo, killing 20 and leaving hopes for productive talks at the UN General Assembly in New York in a meltdown of recrimination.

Nonetheless, something went badly wrong in CAOC last Saturday. They certainly knew that Syrian troops had long been embedded around Deir ez-Zor, fighting ISIS.

A coalition drone had been observing activity around the airfield for at least two days prior to the raid. Somehow the Syrian soldiers, who by all accounts are an exhausted, bedraggled crew who get little support from their boss in Damascus, were mistaken for ISIS.

According to US Central Command out of Tampa, Florida, in this mission coalition forces conducted “13 strikes using attack, bomber, fighter and remotely piloted aircraft against ISIL targets” before they were called off.

That included, according to some reports, sustained low-flying strafing runs by jets who machine-gunned the Syrian soldiers to death for up to an hour.

Talking to the Associated Press in Damascus late this week, Assad rejected expressions of regret from the US and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, insisting the strike was deliberate.

“It wasn’t an accident by one airplane,” he said. “It was four airplanes. You don’t commit a mistake for more than one hour.”

It was by any measure a significant coalition operation that likely involved more than four planes — but exactly who participated in the raid has not been fully declared while the coalition conducts an internal review.

Defence Minister Marise Payne has been cagey, but has confirmed there were plural Australian aircraft involved. These were likely two Australian F/A-18 Classic Hornet jets.

Gunmen from the besieged neighbourhood of Al-Waer prepare to leave the last rebel-held neighborhood of Homs, Syria.Source:AP

Flying with them were two Danish F16s. Also involved was a British Reaper drone, which has the primary function of unleashing precision weapons but also serves as an eye in the sky.

What US planes were involved remains unclear. US Central Command told News Corp Australia via email: “We regret that coalition aircraft may have struck Syrian regime forces 17 Sept.”

In this response, they did not admit direct US participation but the clues are in the earlier comment that “attack” and “bomber” planes were used.

America’s long-range B1s bombers have dropped the most bombs over Iraq and Syria to date in the war. The term “attack” likely refers to US A-10 Warthog ground-attack jets.

Former senior ADF adviser Catherine McGregor, writing in the Daily Telegraph this week, said “in coming days when you hear shrill cries about our aircrew committing war crimes, ignore it.”

However, no credible person suggests the RAAF pilots committed war crimes. Everyone knows things go wrong in war.

The ADF command will not take no comfort from this supportive commentary as they review the operation. They don’t wish to apportion blame on Australian fighter pilots, but to ensure that CAOC — including senior Australians working there — improve their target evaluations.

Just because the victims were Assad’s soldiers, whom we don’t particularly like, the ADF knows this incident cannot be dismissed.

Our jets routinely bomb near where our own Commandos and SAS people are on the ground in Iraq, helping the Iraqi Security Forces. And we may one day have them in Syria, where the US already has special forces assisting Kurds.

We need to know who we’re hitting because that’s who we are, and that’s what we do. We don’t want to hit the wrong people under any circumstance. Especially not our own.