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……

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