Day: September 25, 2014

ISIS: I Am So Bummed!

I am so bummed!  I made a note last night and thought I might have a couple days before there was an answer…..I was slow on the draw and now I am bummed.

Every admin spokesperson that has been trotted out to meet the press has been asked the same question…..who will the troops on the ground be?

So far every person has tapped danced around that question…..most giving vague answer….not one would fess up and admit that they have NO idea which country will step up to the challenge.

My question to myself was…..what will be the newest story to get everyone’s mind off the troop question?

And now I have my answer…….AG Eric Holder is resigning….

Now the media will fixate on this story for a couple of days….Twitter will go ape shit…….and the unanswered question will go away….at least for awhile.

I mean the Iraqi PM has given us a story that there is a plan to attack the subway system in Paris and New York…….a story that comes a little to convenient for me.  And yet that story was not the big breaking story this afternoon……the media is worried more about who will be the replacement for Holder than the possibility of deaths on our subways………damn all this is getting just too predictable………

I am bummed!  I should have been quicker on the uptake…..but it feels good to be able to foresee what will happen.

ISIS: How Effective Are The Airstrikes?

Everyday someone from the Admin goes on the tube and tells the American people and the world just how well the action against ISIS is going……..according to them our airstrikes are having an effect……that they are a success…..beyond imagination (well that may be putting words in their mouths but seems like that is what they are trying to say)……..

First the airstrikes, so far we have conducted about 500 airstrikes, probably more…..we have hit command and control, oil fields, vehicles, barracks and militants……..after so much ordnance aimed at the bad guys and all the chest thumping by the Iraqi government that all is well and on track….I have a question.

How do they measure effective?

ISIS has captured more villages on the border with Turkey………and in Iraq, ISIS was overrun one Iraqi base camp killing many and wounding even more….and now under the massive airstrikes, ISIS has surrounded another Iraqi position………

Despite the addition of US airstrikes complicating their operations, ISIS continues to have the advantage on the ground in Iraq, and for the second time in less than a week has cornered a large camp full of Iraqi soldiers.

200 soldiers are believed to be in the Albu Etha camp, and they report that they have begun to run low on food and ammunition. Despite Iraq’s claims of progress against ISIS since the US strikes began, the losses seem to be mounting.

The Iraqi army is having one setback after another and we are told that they are getting control of the ground portion of this conflict.

This brings up another question.

If the Iraqi army is impotent against ISIS, who will be the ground forces that will do all this ISIS killing on the ground?  The Iraqi army has been training to defend their country for 10+ years and yet they are still not ready to do so.

We could always fall back on the Kurds and Peshmerga……..the problem there is without massive air power they would be sucking the sand they live on……so I ask again……who are these ground forces that will successfully eliminate ISIS?

Does anyone have a good answer to these question?

Turn the page!

“This ISIS Coalition Is Impressive”

Opinion from the desk of the Editor:

 

I keep hearing pundits slap the prez on the back for putting together this “Coalition” of nations in the fight against ISIS…..some have even called it impressive.  To that I say……..WTF?

If true the coalition has about 40 or 50 nations that have signed on for this new fight…..signed on to do what?

A couple of days ago we started the long anticipated war in Syria….and with those strikes 5 nations joined in……Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE and Bahrain and since then NOTHING!

It appears that this was the token attack and their part is through……so what will the remaining 35-45 nations have to do to prove their worth?

Obama said in a speech to the UN that “this fight is not America’s alone”…..so far about 90% of it is on America’s hands.

I am still waiting for the impressive part.

Correction:  After I wrote this draft news came out that the latest attacks on ISIS the UAE and Saudis were involved in the action…….good news that someone else is helping with the heavy lifting….but I am still not very impressed……

How about you?

 

 

 

 

Iraq: ISIS Coalition Operational Briefing #5

Good day and thanx for attending today’s briefing….we attempt to keep the American people on their toes and to give them as much ubder-r4eported info as possible so that they can be more well informed.

The battle for the destruction of ISIS has begun in earnest….France is the first to join in the attacks on ISIS positions in Iraq…..but there is more….and now all out pee spanking of ISIS in Syria has begun………

Since the ‘war’ has begun in real time….my briefings will now become a SitRep, beginning with next briefing #6………..

Item 1–The US to quell all the criticism over allowing the deaths of two American journalists have done what they always do……

The US Senate has unanimously approved a bill providing up to $10 million for information leading to the arrest or conviction of people involved in executing two American journalists murdered by extremists.

“One way we can honor the memories of James Foley and Steven Sotloff is to bring their evil murderers to justice, which this measure will help do,” Senator Marco Rubio said Friday.

Rubio, from Sotloff’s home state of Florida, said it was important to send the message “that the United States will work tirelessly to ensure that the deaths of these beloved journalists do not go unpunished.”

The thought here is that the rest of the world is a greedy money hungry place…..we do this for Osama, al-Zarqawi and it seldom leads to any good actionable intel….what it does do soothes souls over the loss of life.

Item 2–Remember the build up to the attacks on Iraq in 2003?  The admin took to the media to build a case for public support…it worked and guess who is using the same tactic?

Kerry’s comments appear aimed at adding momentum, with the US moving against ISIS in Syria, to go after the Assad government as well. Israel chimed in today as well, claiming they believe Syria secretly kept some chemical weapons no one knew about, though they declined to provide any evidence of that beyond claims that Israel figured they had more than what was destroyed.

This after a month ago when he was thumping his chest at the conclusion of the destruction of Syrian CWs…..does it sound familiar?  It should!

Item 3–It is official…..we, the US, do what we always do….underestimate the enemy……….

Discussing the new ISIS war in an interview with David Ignatius, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper drew parallels between the new war and the US war in Vietnam.

“We underestimated the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese and overestimated the will of the South Vietnamese. In this case, we underestimated ISIS and overestimated the fighting capability of the Iraqi army,” insisted Clapper.

“It boils down to predicting the will to fight, which is an imponderable,” he added, saying that US intelligence had offered “anticipatory intelligence’ about the ISIS surge in Iraq, but had underestimated how big it would be an how fast Iraq would be beaten back.

I include this in the briefing because it is our norm……we underestimate and then we have to play catch up….I have been saying for years…..we need different people in the intel sector….the old farts we have now are worthless.

Item 4–The entire Obama admin has been in a full court press to explain the situation and so far they have done a terrible job…..not a single pertinent question has been answered….lots of cute phrases and chest thumping but NO answers.

My fave interview was the one with UN ambassador S. Powers….she did all the talking points that everyone else is giving the public……..while talking about ground troops that were going to be used she said…..”the Iraqis will step up and with a degree of professionalism”…….to me that yelled volumes…..this is going to be a long engagement……..it takes years for an army to become and function in a professional manner.

Americans need to prepare themselves for another long and arduous conflict.

Item 5–Jahbat al-Nusra was attacked by Hezbollah and many fighters were killed and/or wounded……al-Nusra is an AQ affliated rebel faction and Hezbollah is in defense of the Assad regime……

Hezbollah has launched its first ever drone strikes today against several western Syrian bases belonging to al-Qaeda faction Jabhat al-Nusra, killing 23 fighters.

The strikes targeted bases near the Lebanese border town of Arsal, which has been contested by Nusra, ISIS, and other Syrian Islamist factions off and on in recent months. The strikes were reportedly followed by a ground offensive in which Hezbollah captured several additional fighters.

The big item in that report is the use of drones by Hezbollah…..until now the West had the upper hand in the use of drones to eliminate one’s enemies….this is a situation that needs watching closely.

Item 6–Now that the big show has begun………there is lots of talking about our coalition partners and their participation in the initial strikes….Saudi Arabia is listed as one of those partners….I have reachieved word of something that I cannot verify at this time…….

The Saudi foreign Minster called his American counterpart, demanding him to end “the devastating campaign” against the Muslim population in eastern Syrian territories ,occupied by the so-called Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, reported RT.

During his phone –call, Saud bin Faisal Al Saud, importuned Mr. John Kerry to persuade U.S. president to end all hostilities with the hardline Islamist organization to save tens of thousands of innocent Syrian entrapped civilians and to continue preventing Iran from achieving its goals   , RT quoted the Saudi Daily Al-Okaz as saying.

Sounds like the coalition is not as strong or willing as Mr. Kerry would have us believe.

This concludes Briefing #5……future briefings will be released as events warrant them…..thanx for your time and attention……

Turn the page.