News Iraqi unrest, Syrian unrest, and ISIS/ISIL/Daesh

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AI Thread Summary
The Iraqi government is facing imminent collapse under insurgent pressure, with ISIS reportedly taking control of Mosul. The U.S. has refused military aid to Iraq, primarily to avoid appearing to support Prime Minister al-Maliki, whose Shiite leadership could be seen as backing Iran. Concerns are rising that if insurgents gain control of Baghdad, it could lead to increased conflict with Iran. The Iraqi army, despite being well-trained and outnumbering ISIS, has shown reluctance to engage, leaving military equipment behind in their retreat. The situation is evolving into a civil war, raising fears of broader regional instability and the potential resurgence of terrorism globally.
  • #101
Vanadium 50 said:
... Congress is in session.

House: 113th Congress, 2nd Session · The House is not in session

Senate: Days in session are in red
Yesterday, and today, are not in red.

But looking at their calendars, all I can think is; "What a bunch of slackers..." :mad:

ps. I support the president in his decision to bomb these, these, ugh... I have no word to describe how much I disdain this "ISIS" group.
 
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  • #102
Vanadium 50 said:
Does anyone understand the Constitutional argument for airstrikes without Congressional authorization? The President has said that the Iraq war is over, so it can't be that. Congress is in session.
The President is Commander in Chief according to the Constitution and requires no additional authority.

Presidents sometimes ask for permission in order not to run afoul of the War Powers Act, which:

1. Includes a 60 day grace period.
2. Is likely unconstitutional.
 
  • #103
Dotini said:
In ISIS we have a bit of a Frankenstein's monster for which we need to acknowledge a share of our own culpability - as well as the responsibility to undo the damage we have done, in my opinion.

As part of our efforts to unseat Assad, at least hundreds of what later became ISIS fighters were trained in Jordanian camps by US, British and French. Our allies Saudi Arabia, Qatar and other Arab League states are said to have provided financing and weapons.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/10/us-syria-crisis-rebels-usa-idUSBRE9290FI20130310
At this point, are we correct to assume that "at least hundreds" is something you made up/concluded and have no direct source for?

While I suspect it is likely that some ISIS fighters were trained by the US, I also would be surprised if it is more than dozens.
 
  • #105
russ_watters said:
At this point, are we correct to assume that "at least hundreds" is something you made up/concluded and have no direct source for?

While I suspect it is likely that some ISIS fighters were trained by the US, I also would be surprised if it is more than dozens.

I assumed the following as documentable facts as the basis of my rough estimate of hundreds.

- Training of rebels by US, British and French began in Jordan in 2011, turning out maybe 90/month. So that's a base of at least 2000 in Jordan alone, not to mention Turkey, or western training received at some other time or place.

- It did not seem too great stretch that 10% would have been subsumed into ISIS as most of the rebel factions were gathered by ISIS.

So you may be right, it could be fewer. Maybe it's only 10, but there would appear to be no definitive current count available (to me). I rest my statement on what I think is reasonable and conservative. If I have exceeded the freedom of expression allowed by the Current Events Guidelines, then I am deeply apologetic and beg your forgiveness, for such was definitely not my intent.
 
  • #107
Vanadium 50 said:
Does anyone understand the Constitutional argument for airstrikes without Congressional authorization? The President has said that the Iraq war is over, so it can't be that. Congress is in session.

Apparently the President believes he is still acting under the wide ranging power stemming from the original post 9/11 AUMF to fight terrorists, signed prior to and independent of the Iraq war.

Obama said:
...Moreover, America’s actions are legal. We were attacked on 9/11. Within a week, Congress overwhelmingly authorized the use of force. Under domestic law, and international law, the United States is at war with al Qaeda, the Taliban, and their associated forces. We are at war with an organization that right now would kill as many Americans as they could if we did not stop them first. So this is a just war – a war waged proportionally, in last resort, and in self-defense.

Certainly there are other statements and actions by the President that directly contradict that idea. The aborted effort to ask Congress for an AUMF to hit Assad in Syria for using chemical weapons post "red line" immediately comes to mind.

Congressional support is now growing to sunset the 9/11 AUMF.
http://amendments-rules.house.gov/amendments/SCHIFF_051_xml519140943274327.pdf

The Authorization for Use of Military Force (50 U.S.C. 1541 note; Public Law 107–5 40) is hereby repealed,”
 
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  • #108
OmCheeto said:
Reminds me a bit of the evacuation of the US embassy in Saigon back in '75.

The NVA was a organized army with a military and political structure that had at least some strategic vision for a future and reconciliation. It reminds me more of the Cambodian Democide. Another Utopian dream of purity as an excuse to eliminate the impure by mass murder.
 
  • #110
mheslep said:
Apparently the President believes he is still acting under the wide ranging power stemming from the original post 9/11 AUMF to fight terrorists, signed prior to and independent of the Iraq war.



Certainly there are other statements and actions by the President that directly contradict that idea. The aborted effort to ask Congress for an AUMF to hit Assad in Syria for using chemical weapons post "red line" immediately comes to mind.

Congressional support is now growing to sunset the 9/11 AUMF.
http://amendments-rules.house.gov/amendments/SCHIFF_051_xml519140943274327.pdf
Asking for authority when he already has it is a big mistake IMO (not as big as not asking when he doesn't), but it isn't a mistake if done on purpose. When he is denied permission to do something he thinks he should but doesn't want to, he can then blame the failure on others. I suspect we have a bit of both here.
 
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  • #111
nsaspook said:
The NVA was a organized army with a military and political structure that had at least some strategic vision for a future and reconciliation. It reminds me more of the Cambodian Democide. Another Utopian dream of purity as an excuse to eliminate the impure by mass murder.

Ugh. I remember watching the movie "The Killing Fields", back in the mid 80's. I didn't know they had a unique term for that kind of thing.

wiki on Democide said:
...
The objectives of such a plan of democide include the disintegration of the political and social institutions of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups; the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity; and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups.
...

I probably should have come up with my own term, back in 2003, when I had a fight with someone:

Young naive Om said:
Them. I love it when people use that word. I call them finger pointers. Problems always arise because of 'them'. It is always 'their' fault.
Intolerance, hatred, and violence have been with us since the apple incident.

Themicide

But this Rummel looks like an interesting fellow. Too bad he just passed away this winter.

wiki on Rudolph Rummel said:
...
Rummel was one of the early researchers on democratic peace theory, after Dean Babst. He found that in the period between 1816 and 2005 there were 205 wars between non-democracies, 166 wars between non-democracies and democracies, and no wars between democracies.
...

bolding mine
 
  • #112
OmCheeto said:
But this Rummel looks like an interesting fellow. Too bad he just passed away this winter.

Yes, it's too bad but his website is a trove of information on the subject that I mainly agree with when viewing the events in Iraq and Syria.

Rudolph Rummel
On the other side are totalitarian political regimes. Rather than being a means for resolving differences in views, they try to impose a particular ideology, religion, or solution to social problems on society, regardless of the opposition. For this reason such regimes try to control all aspects of society and deal with conflict by force, coercion, and fear, that is, by power. Moreover, such power breeds political paranoia by the dictator or within a narrow ruling group. This is the fear that others are always plotting to take over rule and would execute those now in power. Finally, there is one hierarchical pyramid of power rather than a multitude of such pyramids as in a democracy, one single coercive organization. This turns all socio-political and economic issues and problems into a matter of us versus them, of those with power versus those without. We should therefore find that the less democratic a regime, the more unchecked and unbalanced power at the center, the more it should commit democide. Democide becomes a device of rule, as in eliminating possible opponents, or a means for achieving one's ideological goal, as in the purification of one's country of an alien race or the reconstruction of society.
 
  • #113
russ_watters said:
Asking for authority when he already has it is a big mistake IMO (not as big as not asking when he doesn't), ...
This discussion usually is about the balance between Congresses Article 1 authority to declare war, and what's understood as the President's Article 2 CiC authority to execute it. I assumed V50's post was a query about a lack of evident Congressional authority. Are you dismissing any need for the balance?

Federalist 69 said:
...The President is to be commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States. In this respect his authority would be nominally the same with that of the king of Great Britain, but in substance much inferior to it. It would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces, as first General and admiral of the Confederacy; while that of the British king extends to the declaring of war and to the raising and regulating of fleets and armies -- all which, by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature...
 
  • #114
nsaspook said:
Yes, it's too bad but his website is a trove of information on the subject that I mainly agree with when viewing the events in Iraq and Syria.

...This turns all socio-political and economic issues and problems into a matter of us versus them...

Sounds familiar. :rolleyes:
 
  • #116
US Weighs Operation to Aid Yazidis in Iraq Mountains

http://www.voanews.com/content/us-w...uate-yazidis-from-iraq-mountains/2409670.html

One, he said, is for U.N. representatives to convince Islamic State fighters to let them go or be pummeled by American airstrikes. The second is a corridor secured by peshmerga or Iraq army troops and U.S. airpower.

To establish a humanitarian corridor, the United Nations and any nations that participated would have to overcome the Islamic State group's military advantage over Kurdish security forces, the peshmerga.

“Security would have to be provided by the Iraqis, especially the Kurds, with air cover from the U.S. and possibly the British and the French,” a U.N. official said on condition of anonymity
 
  • #117
mheslep said:
This discussion usually is about the balance between Congresses Article 1 authority to declare war, and what's understood as the President's Article 2 CiC authority to execute it. I assumed V50's post was a query about a lack of evident Congressional authority. Are you dismissing any need for the balance?
I'm not sure if "need" is really the word you were looking for. The question is whether the "balance" suggested exists or not or, more specifically, what the war powers of the President and Congress, respectively, are.

Since the issue has not been challenged in the courts, we can't know for certain, but there is a lot of historical precedent on which to base a prediction.

The Federalist quote doesn't really enlighten us much because it discusses budget and structure issues as powers of Congress, which aren't in question. Indeed, there is other discussion that I think is clearer from the time:
And this distinction between the President's right to use force defensively, but requiring legislative sanction to initiate an offensive war, was evident in the debate at the Philadelphia Convention over Madison's motion to give Congress not the power "to make War," but the more narrow power "to declare War." [18] In 1928 [19] and again in 1945 [20] , the world community by treaty outlawed the aggressive use of force among nations, and in the process made the declaration of war clause a constitutional anachronism. It is no coincidence that no sovereign state has clearly issued a declaration of war in more than half a century [21].
http://www.fed-soc.org/publications...re-in-the-war-against-international-terrorism

The whole article is a good read. Regarding being too weak as a mistake:
Part of the modern confusion results from a failure to understand what really happened in Korea. As soon as President Truman returned to Washington from Missouri, following the June 25, 1950, invasion, he met with his senior advisers, asked that a resolution be drafted for Congress to consider, and announced that he wanted to make an address to a joint session of Congress. The following morning, he called Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Tom Connally-who had helped draft the UN Charter five years earlier-and asked for advice. As recounted by Connally in his autobiography:

He hadn't as yet made up his mind what to do. . . .
"Do you think I'll have to ask Congress for a declaration of war if I decide to send American forces into Korea?" the President asked?
"If a burglar breaks into your house," I said, "you can shoot at him without going down to the police station and getting permission. . . . You have the right to do it as commander-in-chief and under the UN Charter." [25]

A careful review of the now declassified top-secret records reveals that President Truman "played it by the book" in Korea. He personally consulted repeatedly with the joint leadership of Congress, asked repeatedly to address a joint session of Congress on the crisis, and even provided a draft resolution of approval for Congress to consider [26]. And at every turn, he was advised by congressional leaders of both parties to "stay away" from Congress and assured that he had adequate powers to do what he was doing in Korea under the Constitution and the UN Charter.
While I like the historical precedent, there is also the more practical matter of the wording and execution of the law itself. It provides Congress the ability to give orders to the military. How can the President be CINC if Congress can give orders?

Where the rubber meets the road, though, is that no one (Congress) has never attempted a serious challenge of the President's (any President since Nixon himeself) war authority -- unlike the handful of abuse of power cases that Obama has lost -- while no President has ever accepted the Constitutionality of the act. So for now the question is settled by virtue of being moot.
 
  • #118
mheslep said:
I assumed V50's post was a query about a lack of evident Congressional authority.

My question was even simpler - was the administration's position that this is a brand new war, or a continuation of an old war?
 
  • #119
russ_watters said:
The Federalist quote doesn't really enlighten us much because it discusses budget and structure issues as powers of Congress, which aren't in question.
The budget clause from Hamilton I agree is not in dispute, but the issue of the initiation of war via Congress very much is, and Hamilton makes it clear there which entity has that power.

Indeed, there is other discussion that I think is clearer from the time:

http://www.fed-soc.org/publications...re-in-the-war-against-international-terrorism

The whole article is a good read. Regarding being too weak as a mistake:
That article highlights the problems I have with the current situation rather than resolves them.

For instance, the author cites Truman's consultation with Chairman Connally about Korea: Connally was the same party as Truman. He had an interest in party politics by supporting the President. That and other instances in the article suggest the authority to go to war then is a political one decided by the party in power. It is not. This US system is instead governance by constitutional republic. The President is not "following the book" by consulting with some chairmen in his party. He is obliged by the Constitution to obtain agreement by majority of the full Congress, at least at some point when time and circumstances allow. In requiring the consent of Congress which is inevitably populated by factions, the Constitution as written forces the country to come together in a sober manner, find some area of common ground.

Partisans in Congress will always tend to avoid this obligation if they can find away. What we have now by contrast does the opposite, and as in the example of Truman-Connally; it encourages partisan action dividing the country.

While I like the historical precedent, there is also the more practical matter of the wording and execution of the law itself.

It provides Congress the ability to give orders to the military. How can the President be CINC if Congress can give orders?

Where the rubber meets the road, though, is that no one (Congress) has never attempted a serious challenge of the President's (any President since Nixon himeself) war authority -- unlike the handful of abuse of power cases that Obama has lost -- while no President has ever accepted the Constitutionality of the act. So for now the question is settled by virtue of being moot.

"Where the rubber meets the road, though, is that no one (Congress) has never attempted a serious challenge of the President's (any President since Nixon himeself) war authority"
Never? As we can see, Presidents, being politicians, can count votes before the fact and so rarely force votes they are likely to lose, especially so on a military action vote. Thus I think the recent Syrian red-line fiasco was an example of where the President's war authority was checked, probably due to the Republican majority in the House: Obama floated the issue via proxies and then withdrew.
 
  • #120
This is the strategic vision of ISIS, "convert or be killed and your women and girls kidnapped".

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/storie...ME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-08-16-18-29-11
IRBIL, Iraq (AP) -- Islamic extremists shot scores of Yazidi men to death in Iraq, lining them up in small groups and opening fire with assault rifles before abducting their wives and children, according to an eyewitness, government officials and people who live in the area.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...n-ISIS-impregnated-smash-blond-bloodline.html
Fears are growing for the 300 Yazidi women reportedly kidnapped by Islamic State fighters last week amid claims they would be used to bear children to break up the ancient sect's bloodline.

The minority group is originally Aryan and has retained a fairer complexion, blonde hair and blue eyes by only marrying within the community.

But in a furious bid to convert all non-Muslims, ISIS jihadists have vowed to impregnate the hostages.

Some activity at the Mosul Dam.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_UNITED_STATES_IRAQ_AIRSTRIKES?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-08-16-18-16-52
WASHINGTON (AP) -- U.S. officials say a mix of fighter planes and remotely piloted aircraft have attacked Islamic State militants near the Iraqi city of Irbil and the Mosul Dam.
 
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  • #121
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/iraq-turmoil/kurdish-forces-retake-parts-iraqs-largest-dam-n182561

ERBIL, Iraq — Kurdish forces took over parts of Iraq's largest dam on Sunday less than two weeks after it was captured by the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) extremist group, Kurdish security officials said — as U.S. and Iraqi planes aided their advance by bombing militant targets near the facility.

The U.S. began targeting ISIS fighters with airstrikes a little over a week ago, allowing Kurdish forces to fend off an advance on their regional capital Erbil and to help tens of thousands of members of religious minorities escape the extremists' onslaught. Recapturing the dam would be a significant victory against the Islamic State group, which has seized vast swaths of northern and western Iraq and northeastern Syria. The dam on the Tigris supplies electricity and water for irrigation to a large part of the country.
 
  • #124
So what might be done in response? What could have been done, or not, to avoid these actions?
 
  • #125
mheslep said:
So what might be done in response? What could have been done, or not, to avoid these actions?

I still think ISIS is a mile wide and an inch deep. First you have to make it unappealing to join and be affiliated with them by stopping their advance in Iraq and rolling back their control in Syria by a reconciliation with Assad who is the lesser of evils there. The key IMO is logistics in the long run, cut off the lines of communications and supply to isolate units and then wipe them out when they try to run. Without planes and with only limited anti-air a precision guided bombing strike on their heavy weapon positions is feasible and could break their advances when up against capable fighters like the Kurdish forces who deserve some measure of autonomy in Iraq.

IMO our boneheaded move to support rebel forces in the Syria created a magnet for the vile and barbaric to consolidate and reach critical mass as a force against Assad who could match ISIS toe to toe with atrocities so they looked at the next soft target, Iraq.
 
  • #126
nsaspook said:
If that's their strategy it's a mighty poor one unless your plan is to just kill people by blowing it up, you can't just turn the water off for very long. It's a high value target that they have to defend and reinforce if they plan to keep it, there's little tactical advantage.
Let's see what happens.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...0ab-47b9-889c-d3b00343470f_story.html?hpid=z2

Kurdish and Iraqi officials said that Sunday’s operation was going better than expected and that the dam would soon be under full government control. “We expect to finish this within hours,” said Helgurd Hikmat, a spokesman for the Kurdish forces, known as the pesh merga.

A U.S. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, also said that the operation had “made significant progress.” But he said that recapturing the dam would take time “because there are a lot of IEDs,” or roadside bombs.
Two weeks is how long they held it:
 
  • #127
Killing the men.Impregnating their women.Brainwashing their children unless they kill them instead.

Imagine that happening to you, the moment before they kill you, standing there like a sitting duck with dozens of other men on your side, defenseless, knowing your child and wife are in the hands of monsters and you're not going to be there to protect them anymore.Life ends there.
 
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  • #128
I don't like to think about that.

Great line in "True Grit"

"Ya can't serve papers on a Rat ."
 
  • #129
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...journalist-James-Wright-Foley-warning-US.html

American photojournalist James Wright Foley has been beheaded by ISIS forces
...
It came as President Barack Obama on Monday announced that Kurdish peshmerga troops, supported by U.S. jets, had recaptured the strategically important Mosul Dam, hailing the offensive as a 'major step forward'.

The dam had given the militants control over power and water supplies, and any breach of the vulnerable structure would have threatened thousands of lives.

As the U.S. military strikes the Islamic State group in Iraq, Syrian President Bashar Assad's forces also stepped up their own campaign against militant strongholds in Syria.
 
  • #130
Keep that up and they're going to make somebody mad.


If you kill enough of them, they stop fighting.
Curtis LeMay
 
  • #132
It seems the American freelance journalist James Foley was executed by a Briton, "John the Beatle", but only after he wouldn't or couldn't fetch a $100,000,000 ransom.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...eaded-journalist-is-Londoner-called-John.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/21/w...sed-for-ransom-before-killing-journalist.html

This map, published by the Independent, is somewhat at variance with the map seen above in Astronuc's post. In particular, there are seen several points of connection between ISIS and Turkey, and another node with Jordan.
http://www.independent.co.uk/incoming/article9681939.ece/ALTERNATES/w1024/web-iraq-graphic.jpg
 
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  • #133
Dotini said:
It seems the American freelance journalist James Foley was executed by a Briton, "John the Beatle", but only after he wouldn't or couldn't fetch a $100,000,000 ransom.
[/url]

Kidnapping, ransom and murder sounds more like old school mafia tactics than jihad. I'm sorry for the families but anyone held by these criminals should be assumed as lost forever.

The picture of ISIS as the spawn of Assad seems accurate but if the choice is between ISIS and Assad, I'll take Assad because at least someone (Russia) has some control of his behavior.
Screen_Shot_2014-08-20_at_11.21.31_AM.0.png
 
  • #134
Islamic State 'beyond anything we've seen': US
http://news.yahoo.com/us-must-defeated-syria-well-iraq-201552159.html

Hagel warned that the Islamic State is better armed, trained and funded than any recent militant threat.

"They marry ideology and a sophistication of strategic and tactical military prowess. They are tremendously well funded. This is beyond anything we have seen," Hagel told a news conference.
Deranged people with military weapons.
 
  • #135
  • #136
nsaspook said:
Kidnapping, ransom and murder sounds more like old school mafia tactics than jihad. I'm sorry for the families but anyone held by these criminals should be assumed as lost forever.

The picture of ISIS as the spawn of Assad seems accurate but if the choice is between ISIS and Assad, I'll take Assad because at least someone (Russia) has some control of his behavior.
Screen_Shot_2014-08-20_at_11.21.31_AM.0.png

Control? A quarter million killed in the Syrian civil war, three million refugees, 650 people killed by nerve gas, an attempt at a nuclear reactor? IS has international financing as well, but Ill not be counting them as controlled.
 
  • #137
mheslep said:
Control? A quarter million killed in the Syrian civil war, three million refugees, 650 people killed by nerve gas, an attempt at a nuclear reactor? IS has international financing as well, but Ill not be counting them as controlled.

I completely understand but imagine if a group like ISIS had the same capabilities and was fighting a war to the death with forces supported by the west and others. Influence might be a better word than control in Syria but Russia has reigned in actions in Syria that would have caused an international response but don't care about 'normal' internal security matters as long has he pays in cash and Assad doesn't care about anything else but saying in power with the help of Russia.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...wont-give-up-syria-no-matter-what-obama-does/

Deals can be made about secular things like money and power but I don't see much room for bargaining with the ideological alignment of ISIS to reestablish a system of governance known as the Caliphate.
 
  • #138
This is a fascinating view inside the situation and minds of the ISIS. Actual journalism by Vice News. I won't embed this video because it's very graphic at times. Your choice.

 
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  • #139
Greg Bernhardt said:
This is a fascinating view inside the situation and minds of the ISIS. Actual journalism by Vice News. I won't embed this video because it's very graphic at times. Your choice.



I first found out about Vice at uni and thought they were just for for fun (they still do some quite amusing, if odd, features) but in recent years I've really started to see some quality journalism. Far better than a lot of mainstream sources.
 
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  • #140
http://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2014/08/gen-allen-destroy-islamic-state-now/92012/?oref=d-river

Bottom line: The president deserves great credit in attacking IS. It was the gravest of decisions for him. But a comprehensive American and international response now — NOW — is vital to the destruction of this threat. The execution of James Foley is an act we should not forgive nor should we forget, it embodies and brings home to us all what this group represents. The Islamic State is an entity beyond the pale of humanity and it must be eradicated. If we delay now, we will pay later.

It will take more than military force to eliminate the reasons ISIS has grown so quickly as the root problems in the area will still exist without them but it's something that must happen first before any political solution IMO.
 
  • #141
IMO, defeating ISIS may well require the US to play nice with its erstwhile enemies Iran, Russia and Assad, and play rough with its erstwhile friends Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Turkey and Jordan.
 
  • #142
Dotini said:
IMO, defeating ISIS may well require the US to play nice with its erstwhile enemies Iran, Russia and Assad, and play rough with its erstwhile friends Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, Turkey and Jordan.

It does and it makes be worry that the current US team might not be up to the challenge of managing the brutal tactics our 'friends' will use to defeat ISIS on the ground if we move beyond containment to eradication.
 
  • #143
nsaspook said:
It does and it makes be worry that the current US team might not be up to the challenge of managing the brutal tactics our 'friends' will use to defeat ISIS on the ground if we move beyond containment to eradication.

I have a great deal of admiration and respect for Chuck Hagel. Martin Dempsey I also like. Alas, I am worried about our State Department.
 
  • #144
I'm 100% sure the DOD can handle any task given but I see the possible endgame for ISIS being very messy as we must attack ISIS fighters in Syria with US based weapons to destroy the cross-border supply lines and equipment to isolate the fighters in Iraq and then let Syria retake it's territory as a likely condition of any deal. When their line break and some are on the run don't expect people who have been brutalized by them to just let them go back home. The pictures won't be pretty.
 
  • #145
nsaspook said:
Russia has reigned in actions in Syria
I'm unaware of any reigning in by Russia. Can you name an example? Syria continues to gas people.

I'm aware of some slight reigning in of Syria by the U.S., namely the disposal of some chemical weapons.
 
  • #146
nsaspook said:
I'm 100% sure the DOD can handle any task given ...
Recent U.S. military record with guerrilla wars is mixed, not perfect. Military success in Iraq, yes. Afghanistan, not so much.
 
  • #147
mheslep said:
Recent U.S. military record with guerrilla wars is mixed, not perfect. Military success in Iraq, yes. Afghanistan, not so much.

This is not guerrilla warfare where they come out at night and disappear into the shadows freely mixing with non-combatants. In the cities its urban combat that our troops are very well trained for but I don't expect us to get much involved in that directly.

Afghanistan is a case where bombing them to the stone-age can't work because the Russians already did that in the 80s.
 
  • #148
mheslep said:
I'm unaware of any reigning in by Russia. Can you name an example? Syria continues to gas people.

As I said the limits on Assad are those that would cause another international response (like ISIS is doing now) that would threaten Russian interests in the area. Internal security matters including possible use of chlorine gas as a chemical agent (a pulmonary irritating agent instead of a explicit chemical weapon and deadly neurotoxin) IMO haven't reached that threshold.
 
  • #149
nsaspook said:
This is not guerrilla warfare where they come out at night and disappear into the shadows freely mixing with non-combatants. In the cities its urban combat that our troops are very well trained for but I don't expect us to get much involved in that directly.

If the US put troops forward to combat IS you can bet your bottom dollar it would become guerrilla warfare. Thousands of civilians have flocked to IS and given that they aren't a state army they can melt back into civilian life, or across the borders back into Syria. There's also the question of what US troops would actually achieve. If they halt this advance what's to stop IS coming back? Or other groups taking advantage of local dissatisfaction.

nsaspook said:
Afghanistan is a case where bombing them to the stone-age can't work because the Russians already did that in the 80s.

I really hope this is some sort of bad sense of humour because if not it doesn't reveal anything good about you. You realize that any sort of mass bombing is going to hugely affect the civilian population? Terrorist groups can easily jump borders and find shelter elsewhere. The people who live there: not so much. And if their infrastructure is "bombed to the Stone Age" then they are going to experience abject poverty. The sort which is a) horrific any human being should live through and b) a great way to radicalise people and create more terrorists.
 
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