Good day……I would like to make a short statement…..for weeks now political leaders have gone before the cameras to voice their opinion about the use of US forces in the Middle East….and almost to a person they smile while talking…..THERE IS NOTHING ABOUT USING AMERICAN TROOPS TO FIGHT A WAR!

Item 1–Recently I warned the public of this….I wrote an op-ed on Ace News Room……..http://acenewsroom.net/2014/11/13/iraq-a-hidden-agenda/

In comments over the weekend, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel conceded that he is going to have to “consider” the deployment of ground troops to Iraq, though he reiterated that they would not be “combat troops.”

The distinction is increasingly ill-defined, as there are in point of fact already some 3,000 US ground troops in Iraq, and some of them are already on the front lines in the Anbar Province in an “advisory” capacity.

Americans need to pay attention and ask the right questions…..

Item 2–Hagel has said that the Us needs a “game changing technology”…..some please ask him what the Hell that is…..

Despite spending several times more on its military than anyone else, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel believes the US military advantage is not nearly overwhelming enough, and warns Russia and/or China are both gaining on them.

Hagel insists that what the US really needs is some sort of new game-changing military technology that will ensure that the Pentagon “overmatches” the other nations for decades to come.

And does this apply to the fight with ISIS?

Item 3–Kurdish leader gives a battle update…….

The Islamic State (Isis) has recruited an army hundreds of thousands strong, far larger than previous estimates by the CIA, according to a senior Kurdish leader. He said the ability of Isis to attack on many widely separated fronts in Iraq and Syria at the same time shows that the number of militant fighters is at least 200,000, seven or eight times bigger than foreign in intelligence estimates of up to 31,500 men.

Fuad Hussein, the chief of staff of the Kurdish President Massoud Barzani said in an exclusive interview with The Independent on Sunday that “I am talking about hundreds of thousands of fighters because they are able to mobilise Arab young men in the territory they have taken.”

This to me is a ploy to get more cash and assistance…..ISIS has a large army bit that figure is a bit too high…..

Item 4–Even with the extra fighters Kobane is a stalemate….tit for tat…back and forth……

BEIRUT // ISIL is locked in a war of attrition in the Syrian border town of Kobani, where Kurdish fighters backed by US-led airstrikes are mounting fierce resistance.

“[ISIL] controls more than half of the town but is unable to advance further,” he said. Buoyed by a string of victories in Syria and Iraq, ISIL launched a major offensive on September 16 to seize Kobani and expand its self-proclaimed Islamic “caliphate”.

The militants believed they would quickly conquer the small town in northern Syria, which was little known to the outside world before the deadly fighting broke out.

And have you noticed that the news is dwindling…..why?

Item 5–We, the public, hear constantly about the effectiveness of the Coalition airstrikes….but Jane’s see it another way…..

The US air war in Iraq is not leading to any tangible results in slowing ISIS’ ability to carry out attacks, according to analysts from IHS Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Center (JTIC).

Analysts there, including JTIC head Matthew Herman, say that ISIS has showed they are still “calling the shots” in Iraq, and that the number of attacks they are carrying out on a monthly basis seems entirely unaffected by the US war.

If anything, the number of attacks has picked up significantly since June, and Jane’s conceded that their own database is likely calculating only a fraction of the overall ISIS campaign.

OOPS!  Not the news that will be made ready available to the general public……

That concludes today’s briefing……

Thanx for your time and attention……

Turn The Page!

Good day my fellow bloggers……

Item 1–The BIG news coming out about the use of force against ISIS……..

To the extent that anyone still believes President Obama’s pledge that the ever-growing number of ground troops sent to Iraq, the notion was destroyed by comments from Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Martin Dempsey in testimony to Congress.

Gen. Dempsey confirmed that the US is “actively considering” the use of ground troops in direct combat roles against ISIS, in the course of its plans to send yet more troops on top of the 3,000 already there.

If anyone finds this statement a surprise…..may I suggest that you bookmark this site and you will NO longer be surprised…..

Item 2–The battle for Congressional supremacy over this conflict is beginning……

House Armed Services Chief Rep. Buck McKeon (R – CA) today warned that he will block any attempt to pass an authorization for the new ISIS war that includes any restriction on the use of US ground troops.

McKeon cited comments from former Pentagon chiefs saying the new war needed “boots on the ground,” and insisted any bill that aimed to limit that would be dead on arrival in his committee.

Now that the neocons control Congress it is NO longer “if” Americans will return to combat but rather “when”……

Item 3–After days of speculation on whether al-Baghdadi is injured or worse is over……

After a few days of speculation about an attempted US airstrike against him, ISIS leader Caliph Abu Bakr al-Bagdadi has emerged with a new audio recording which appears to have shown he survives.

The audio recording wasn’t specifically dated, though Baghdadi did make mentions to events that took place after the US airstrike

Item 4–It is now official….the Coalition has a new target other than ISIS…….

Details of the pact are still unclear, but the Associated Press is reporting that a deal has been signed between ISIS and al-Qaeda’s Jabhat al-Nusra somewhere in northern Syria.

The deal, signed last week, at the very least has the two factions, the largest in the Syrian rebellion, agreeing not to fight against one another, and to work together to some length against their mutual enemies, which is to say both the US and Syrian governments.

It is confirmed and the enemies are multiplying…..things will get more complicated…..

Item 5–The leader of ISIS has called on the jihad to target Saudi Arabia………

Baghdadi urged supporters in Saudi Arabia, the world’s top oil exporter, to take the fight to the rulers of the kingdom, which has joined the US.-led coalition in mounting air strikes against the Islamic State group in Syria.

If his followers do as told….the Middle East will become a lot more chaotic than it is now……

That concludes today’s briefing…..next one will be on Monday….

Thanx for your time and attention……

Turn The Page!

Good day and welcome to today’s briefing….

Events are starting to accelerate….granted at a slow pace….but it is getting more and more likely that the US will be embroiled in another conflict in the Middle East…..an extended conflict that could cross decades…….

Item 1–ISIS is quickly becoming a world wide phenom…..there have been attacks in Egypt linked to ISIS….and now……

ANSYAAD Mbai retired a fortnight ago after 12 years leading Indonesia’s ferocious anti-terror campaign, but he says his country’s terror laws are now the “weakest in the world” and its prisons too soft on men such as jihadist Abu Bakar Bashir.

Indonesia is the most populous Muslim country….and now there seems to be a foothold being eked out….a situation that needs to be watched.

Item 2–Iraqi PM recently purged some high officers from the military and he has done it once again…….

Despite receiving more than $25 billion in American training and equipment over the past 10 years, the Iraqi military buckled, and thousands of troops fled, in the face of the Islamic State’s rapid advance across Iraq this summer. Only half the remaining units are considered fit to fight, according to American officials.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said in a statement late Wednesday that he was removing the 36 commanders and installing 18 others to promote professionalism and “combat corruption.”

I understand the purging of weal links I question to validity of this action….he is making more disenfranchised commanding officers that could join ISIS in revenge.

Item 3–News out of Syria is about the US desire to oust Assad…….

The Obama Administration today realized what everyone else has known for quite some time, that their strategy in the new ISIS war in simply not working. Unfortunately, they seem to be shifting toward even deeper escalation of the war, particularly in Syria.

Instead, the new Syria strategy appears to be the military removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, even though his forces are the major significant anti-ISIS force inside Syria, and officials now seem to believe that ousting Assad first and cobbling together a new regime from the non-existent “moderate” factions that the Pentagon is supposed to be creating, is the key to the war.

Was this announcement necessary?  There are enough problems with the US strategy….why make more enemies?

Item 4–US troops return to al-Anbar……..

The return of US ground troops to the Anbar Province, the site of some of the bloodiest battles during the last US occupation of Iraq, threatens to bring those US troops directly into contact with ISIS.

Indeed, though the Pentagon downplays the risk of any incidents, saying the troops will remain at “fixed sites” inside Anbar, such an incident may be inevitable, with ISIS controlling more than 80 percent of Anbar, and doubtless keen to inflict US military casualties.

This could be the start of something big…….

Item 5–In the fight for Kobane….Kurdish forces have had a minor success……

(Reuters) – Kurdish forces blocked a road Islamic State militants use to resupply their forces in a Syrian town on the Turkish border, a town official and a monitoring group said on Wednesday, the first major gain against the jihadists after weeks of violence.

Iraqi-Kurdish peshmerga forces crossed into Kobani on Oct. 31 to help the besieged Kurdish YPG and YPJ fighters in the town. The combined forces have now cut off the road which leads south east to the village of Hilnij, the sources said.

Cutting off supplies is an excellent move….could prove to be decisive in the battle for Kobane…..

Item 6–Another Middle East country is being drawn into the conflict against ISIS….Lebanon…….

Beirut // The civil war in Syria has brought a bounty of assistance to Lebanon’s military, as outside powers compete for influence and seek to prevent Islamist extremists spreading across the border.

A deal signed last week will give the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) US$3 billion (Dh11bn) worth of French weaponry, paid for by Saudi Arabia. The United States has stepped up a long-standing programme of military assistance, and even Iran, a backer of the Shiite Hizbollah militia – long considered Lebanon’s most powerful fighting force – has offered to arm the military.

Under the Saudi military assistance, the LAF said it has requested heavy machine guns, armoured personnel carriers, vehicles, anti-tank weapons, rockets, artillery, ammunition and communications systems. The first deliveries can be expected early next year, once the protocols are signed.

It is a waiting game to see how this will effect the war on ISIS….the mission seems to be expanding daily……the more complicated the strategy becomes the no likely it will fail………..

That concludes today’s briefing…….events will dictate the direction and so far the direction is like a rudderless ship….what is needed most is CLARITY if mission.

Thanx for your time and attention…….

Turn The Page!

Good day…..

I sincerely hope that all my readers had a pleasant and restful day yesterday……with that said…..shall we begin today’s briefing?

Item 1–US returns to Anbar…….

With some 1,500 additional US ground troops heading to Iraq, the first advance team of US forces has gone to the Anbar Province, the restive southwestern province held almost entirely by ISIS.

Though the Pentagon denied any plans to send the troops into combat, they insisted they are “prepared to defend themselves,” and sending them to the front lines makes this virtually inevitable.

What do you think will be the result of sending US troops into Anbar?

Item 2–It appears that not everyone sees the airstrikes as a good thing……

Hadi al-Bahra, the head of the self-proclaimed government-in-exile of Syria, the Syrian National Coalition (SNC), today blasted the US for its attacks on ISIS, saying they are undermining the rebellion they think will eventually land the SNC in power.

The SNC is nominally the head of the Free Syrian Army (FSA), one of the primary “moderate” rebel factions, but one which is also virtually entirely landless, as ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra take most of the rebel territory.

Bahra was also critical of the US for attacking Nusra, which is al-Qaeda’s wing in Syria, saying it was undercutting the SNC’s efforts for a “permanent solution to the crisis,” which is to say their installation as the actual government.

Things in this war are now becoming as clear as a particulate matter suspended in a liquid…..MUD!

Item 3–ISIS may have just expanded its influence outside of the Levant……

ISIS has garnered its first major international ally in the form of Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, an Egyptian militant group the New York Times calls the country’s most dangerous. That organization pledged obedience to ISIS yesterday, the Times reports. Until now, Ansar Beit al-Maqdis has largely targeted only Egypt’s official forces, but the new alliance could prompt it to begin killing civilians.

This could change the reach of the coalition and its activities……

Item 4–I have been worried about sectarian violence returning to Iraq and it appears that I am not alone……

The Iraqi military is trying to keep Shi’ite militias out of the front-line territories in central Iraq. It’s not hard to see why, with the reports of Shi’ite militias massacring Sunni tribesmen time and again in revenge killings.

The militias claim that those slain were ISIS backers, and that the bloody revenge killings are entirely appropriate. The efforts to keep them out of Sunni towns are also facing growing political backlash.

I guess justification can be made for deeds the world may not appreciate….Israel is a prime example……

Item 5–ISIS is trying to make IS a gold backed economy…….

In a move that appears to be aimed at bolstering its claim to be the legitimate revitalization of the Islamic Caliphate, ISIS has announced plans to introduce a new, or rather very old, currency to its territory.

Details are still scant, but imams in Iraq’s Nineveh Province, an ISIS stronghold, say the plan is to introduce new gold and silver coins based on the specifications of those used during the original caliphate

That concludes today’s briefing…………

Thanx for your time and attention…….

Turn The Page!

Good day….It has been a busy week with all the comedy surrounding the latest futile attempt to find an active government……all the while the war with no name is raging…..maybe now the results of this conflict will be news once again…….

Item 1–the big news over the weekend is that the prez has written a letter to the leader of Iran about the battle with ISIS……

President Obama secretly penned a letter to Ayatollah Khamenei last month, sources tell the Wall Street Journal, in an attempt to prod the Iranian leader toward a nuclear deal while simultaneously underscoring the two nations’ joint interest in fighting ISIS—with any cooperation on the latter being what the Journal calls “largely contingent” on the former. Senior American officials wouldn’t talk about the letter, and NPR notes that White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said today that he’s “not in a position to talk about private correspondence between the president and another world leader.” Khamenei has reportedly never directly responded to any of Obama’s previous three letters.

This could be a good thing for the war on ISIS….but there will be consequences that few are willing to see….

Item 2–In a Friday news dump the word is that more troops will be sent to Iraq as ‘advisers’……..

The White House has announced that President Obama has authorized a plan to more than double the number of US ground troops in Iraq, signing off on another 1,500 troops.

Officials declined to offer details about the timings of the deployments, or what the massive number of new “advisers” will actually be doing on the ground in Baghdad and Irbil.

This is not news to anyone watching the news but the question not asked is…..we are told that these troops are not a ground force but rather will be there to “advise, train and assist”…..there is my problem…the word “ASSIST”….NO one will define what it means to “assist”.

Item 3–There is no thing that will be a downfall moment….civilian deaths….

US airstrikes against the town of Harem, in the Idlib Province of Syria, killed a number of civilians, including at least four children, locals have confirmed. Images of slain children were released via social media.

The Pentagon confirmed the strikes in the area, insisting they were targeting “Khorasan,” which is to say Syria’s Jabhat al-Nusra faction, as Khorasan is a term the US invented to create a distinction other rebels say doesn’t exist.

I am still NOT convinced of the existence of this “super cell” of AQ.

Item 4–The conflict in Iraq is once again splitting along sectarian lines….this was the US big problem after the 2003 invasion…..nothing we are doing today will make that split any good.

Item 5–The key to this coalition was always going to be Turkey…..but is Turkey the good partner?

A former member of ISIS has revealed the extent to which the cooperation of the Turkish military allows the terrorist group, who now control large parts of Iraq and Syria, to travel through Turkish territory to reinforce fighters battling Kurdish forces.

A reluctant former communications technician working for Islamic State, now going by the pseudonym ‘Sherko Omer’, who managed to escape the group, told Newsweek that he travelled in a convoy of trucks as part of an ISIS unit from their stronghold in Raqqa, across Turkish border, through Turkey and then back across the border to attack Syrian Kurds in the city of Serekaniye in northern Syria in February.

If true….how can an action be successful?

This concludes today’s briefing…….

Thanx for your time and attention.

Turn The Page

With the worthless electoral exercise out of the way now we can return to the important stuff happening in the world…..and nothing is more important the US latest war…….

Quiet and I will begin the briefing…….

Item 1–Remember Irbil?  It pretty much started this whole war thingy…..We jumped into this to protect…..and now it appears that the best laid plans…….

The Kurdish Peshmerga were making some gains against ISIS in late September and early October, backed by US warplanes. The gains began to reverse with an ISIS counteroffensive in mid-October.

At this point, ISIS seems to have recovered much of the territory it ceded in the early days of the US war, and is once again pushing deep into Kurdish territory, with fighting today focusing on a town just 60 km from the Kurdish capital of Irbil.

Irbil is NOT looking so promising for the coalition…..

Item 2–All reports appear to point to a certain degree of insatiability with the Coalition……

The Pentagon has denied that the US strategy against Islamic State (Isis) is in disarray after a series of setbacks as the war known as Operation Inherent Resolve stretches into its fourth month.

“I don’t believe that we view current events as a major setback to the goals that we’ve set with respect to training and equipping the moderate opposition” in Syria, said Rear Admiral John Kirby, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman.

Kirby’s remarks came days after an al-Qaida-aligned faction routed one of the Syrian resistance groups on which the US has been depending to anchor an anti-Isis proxy force. The Nusra Front, al-Qaida’s affiliate in Syria, appears now to be allying with Isis, an indication that the Islamist extremist group’s fortunes are rising.

Maybe it is time for the Coalition to come up with a real plan for ISIS……..

Item 3–With a new GOP controlled Congress will that change the direction of the ISIS strategy?

Most of the major party leaders on both sides of the aisle were pretty straightforward about their opposition to voting on the ISIS war before the Tuesday election. President Obama was fine with it at the time, insisting he didn’t need authorization.

Now that the election’s over, President Obama is changing his tune, and pushing for the lame duck Congress to quickly rubber stamp the conflict before the new one takes office.

The Republicans took control of the Senate in Tuesday’s elections, but much more important than which party took control is the nature of the incoming Senators from the new ruling party.

With ISIS continuing to secure gains across the Anbar Province, Iraq’s counteroffensive is mostly centered on the region due north of Baghdad. The push is slow going.

But it’s not so much the Iraqi military leadership commanding their own counteroffensive, nor really doing the heavy lifting in the fighting, as Shi’ite allies from overseas are increasingly involved.

Iraq’s foreign minister says Baghdad doesn’t want foreign military personnel on Iraqi soil to combat Islamic State group extremists, but would accept training from abroad for its soldiers.

Good day and today is election day and all eyes will be on the gutless pricks that are running for control….NO one will be watching the Middle East….well No one but me and that is why your information is far superior than that of the MSM….I will try to be brief…I would not want to impair my fellow Americans from making the wrong decisions.

Shall we begin the briefing?

Item 1–There has been a wealth of support and a wealth condemnation over this whole ISIS situation……and it just keeps getting wilder…..

Major losses on both the Iraqi and Syrian sides of the ISIS conflict emerged over the weekend, with ISIS routing a pro-Iraqi govt Sunni tribe and massacring hundreds of them, while Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaeda’s wing in Syria, forced a key US-allied moderate rebel faction to surrender.

The Pentagon is trying to downplay the problems, despite these both being clearly huge defeats for their strategy in the ever-escalating war, and is mostly falling back on semantic arguments to deflect concerns.

Clarity of the situation is in short supply…..will it get better?

Item 2–ISIS is working hard to control as many resources of funds as possible…….

After pushing back into the Sha’ar Gas Field late last week, ISIS seems to be continuing their offensive in the Homs Province, now taking the nearby Jahar field.

ISIS posted photos showing their flag flying over the Jahar field today online, and also posted photos they claimed were Syrian vehicles and weaponry seized during the battle to take the site.

Item 3–US is considering attacking another ‘rebel’ group…….

U.S. officials are weighing whether to broaden the air campaign in Syria to strike a militant group that is a rival to the Islamic State and that is poised to take over a strategically vital corridor from Turkey.

Extremists from the al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra group were said Monday to be within a few miles of the Bab ­al-Hawa crossing in northwestern Syria on the Turkish border, one of only two openings through which the moderate Free Syrian Army receives military and humanitarian supplies provided by the United States and other backers.

That might be a good idea considering al-Nusra has joined forces with ISIS on occasions…..

Item 4–the attempt by the Coalition of getting the Sunni tribes to sign onto another “awakening” is hitting a few snags….

The prospects of a new Iraqi Sunni “awakening” to combat the Islamic State (IS) are being stifled by the terrorist group’s brutal and effective intelligence operation, according to Ali Mamouri.

Mamouri writes from Iraq: “The Islamic State differs from its predecessors and similar groups by running a powerful intelligence apparatus that is strong and has plenty of security experience acquired by intelligence officers from the previous regime. The IS intelligence apparatus carries out various types of operations, similar to other intelligence apparatuses around the world. One of its most important operations is to monitor and identify its opponents, to eliminate them immediately and to avoid the possibility of the Iraqi government, and other local and regional opposing parties, to infiltrate its intelligence apparatus, or a military opposition to emerge on its territory.”

Today’s briefing is a short one…….after all it is election day and everyone should get out and vote!

Thanx for your time and attention……

Turn The Page!

Good day and welcome to a new week of the fight against ISIS…….

The 150Kurds after entered the city of Kobane to join the fight…..NO reports of their successes or failure as of yet.

Item 1–SEC of Defense, Chuck Hagel, has given a stark prediction……

“We are living through one of these historic, defining times,” Hagel warned, “We are seeing a new world order – post World War II, post Soviet Union implosion.”

Hagel went on to make it quite clear what that meant, open-ended war with ISIS and open-ended war with various other enemies of the US military will require a “steady, long-term effort” to defeat.

Perpetual war….now there is a wonderful thought, eh?

Item 2–There has been many people both condemning and conratulating the US and the Coalition….depending on whom you choose to believe…….

White House officials are loudly trying to downplay the warnings about their failing Syrian policy made clear in a recent memo by Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, saying that the policy is definitely working.

“The policy that we have for Assad is really clear: We believe that he’s lost the legitimacy to lead,” insisted White House spokesman Josh Earnest. Hagel’s memo warned that the White House insistence on being anti-Assad was being undercut by the war effort helping Assad.

The memo further warned that the US has no end game strategy for the conflict, something which didn’t seem to be seriously contested by the White House, which continues to talk up an extremely long war with no end in sight.

Personally, I think that their analysis is a bit too optimistic for a pessimistic situation…..

Item 3–It appears the unity that the two sects of Islam have been missing for centuries may be coming of age……

Iraq’s most senior Shi’ite cleric called on the government on Friday to rush to the aid of Sunni tribes battling Islamic State, after the militant group executed at least 220 tribesmen west of Baghdad this week.

Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani’s comments show how the threat posed by Islamic State, which follows an ultra-hardline version of Sunni Islam, has pushed some Shi’ites and Sunnis to overcome their sectarian differences and face a common enemy.

If it can be accomplished then this situation could be the best years since the beginning.

Item 4–The ‘moderates’ that the coalition is putting all their chips on may not be the well oiled as DC would want the world to believe……

The Obama Administration continues to insist that its strategy in Syria is “working,” but the setbacks on the ground are growing more dramatic by the day, and the Syrian Revolutionary Front, one of the largest “vetted, moderate” US-backed rebel forces, has been effectively wiped out.

The Revolutionary Front was routed by both ISIS and al-Qaeda’s Jabhat al-Nusra in recent days, and has now surrendered outright after the fall of Deir Sinbal, agreeing to hand over all their weapons and bases to Nusra.

Keep in mind that al-Nusra is an AQ affiliate……couldthe two factions be combining in the war?

Item 5–The forces of the Coalition and Iraq are preparing for an offensive action……

In Syria, the prospect of a pro-US counteroffensive against ISIS seems to be permanently on delay for lack of pro-US fighters. Even in Iraq, where the government’s forces are allies, the plans are vague, and a long way out.

US officials say that the current planning is around the idea of mounting a major spring offensive in 2015, with the goal of retaking the major highways and several major cities from ISIS by the end of the year.

Basically, they are saying that the Coalition will be ready for a major offensive against ISIS in 6 months….. I do not see the level of readiness in 6 months…..if it is carried out I can see a major problem…….

I realize that the approaching election may seem important…..and to some it is….but to ignore the situation in the Middle east shows a seriousness  of folly….the election will be over in a week but this war will be going and going…..possibly for the next 20 years.

That concludes today’s briefing….more to come as the events warrant…….

Thanx for your time and attention…….

Turn The Page!