Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

The Islamic state

On Bellingcat The Mosul Operation: An Interim Open-source Assessment Of Conflict-related Environmental Damage
...
With the recent liberation of east Mosul, verification of this remote collected data is imperative. The international community should provide support in terms of expertise, financial capacity, and equipment to both the Iraqi government and international organisations that operate in the field to assess if there are acute or long-term environmental health threats to residents of affected communities in and around Mosul and the wider Ninawa province. Without out, Iraqi communities are faced with potential long-term risk that adds to the already existing suffering from the direct impact of war on their lives and livelihoods.
Click to expand...
A lot.
 
On War Is Boring America Has Misused Its Military Power in the Middle East

Not much new here. As with many things you need to go all the way back to Jimmy Carter and ZBig tilting against the USSR in the Hindu Kush. The creation of CENTCOM and two and a half decades of being distracted in dusty places to no good end.

It does occur to me we now have another regime in DC seemingly eager to kick over the apple cart and unleash creative chaos. With the neocons it was the ME that was going to remake itself God intended into Mall America. All it needed was a little more bombing and unleashed free markets. And that went so well. This time it's the entire carefully constructed globalised order.
 
On Musings On Iraq Mosul Campaign Day 127, Feb 21, 2017
...
The United Nations was also noting the continued difficulties in east Mosul and for those still displaced. It was concerned with the arbitrary arrests made by the ISF of suspected IS sympathizers at camps. The news of the lack of services, IS attacks, and arrests of men and boys in east Mosul has stopped some families from returning there. The army for instance, closed down the Karama neighborhood and took all the military aged males to a school and searched them looking for weapons and evidence of being IS members or sympathizers. There are more people currently going back to the city however, mostly to Intisar, Mithaq, Sumer and Gogjali, the last of which is just outside of Mosul. Those areas that were last to be freed, which were along the Tigris River and in the northeast are facing high levels of poverty and a severe lack of food. Once markets are re-opened and supplies start flowing into those areas they will recover. People don’t have much money and there are no jobs however. Many of those going back say they want to find work, secure their property and try to collect their pensions. There is a constant flow of people in and out of the city. More people are doing the latter. While many want to rebuild their lives, things are far from easy doing so. People have also started complaining about the heavy handedness of the security forces, and the lack of government support. Those are likely to increase as more time passes as the ISF is hunting down IS members and Baghdad has no money for reconstruction.
Click to expand...
They really need to get better at supporting the population of Mosul in liberated areas. Mosul is liable to fall back to being as it was 2010 with a mafia like IS infestation waiting for its moment.
 
On ISW Warning Update: The Expansion of ISIS in Northwestern Afghanistan
Key Takeaway: ISIS Wilayat Khorasan may be developing a regional powerbase in northwestern Afghanistan. Former Taliban militants operating in the name of ISIS executed international aid workers and held others captive in a prison in Jowzjan Province in February 2017, a step change in ISIS’s operations in Afghanistan. ISIS may increasingly use this hub to regenerate manpower as it suffers loses elsewhere, threatening US and NATO interests in multiple regions across Afghanistan. Malign external actors like Russia and Iran could also use ISIS’s expansion in the region to validate their support of Taliban militants and undermine the U.S. and NATO.
...
Click to expand...
Our old friend the Gen Rashid Dostum gets a mention. The agile old warlord who has swapped sides a few times in Afghanistan's decades log civil war. He is "resting" facing possible prosecution and his powerful Junbish Militia has stood down in the NW areas that's going IS. Whatever his position here it's probably giving him leverage with the US.

ISW thinks the Russians might see this as an opportunity to support the Taliban as an anti-IS force. The Iranians, never folk to waste a tactically useful enemy, have already supported some Taliban units against IS.
 
On War On The Rocks COUNTER-TERRORISM FROM BUSH TO OBAMA TO TRUMP

A podcast discussion included folks who've been deeply involved.

Makes the point that a big problem is US allies in the GWOT often don't share US priorities. Saleh in Yemen for instance was only interested in fighting AQ enough to milk support from Uncle Sam while his main focus was a brutal war against his now allies the Houthis. I'd add some would say clan Saleh actually enabled AQAP. The KSA's war there certainly has. They point out the Turks were more interested in toppling Assad than IS. It should be said that was an earlier US position before IS took Mosul.

Trump's obsessional insistence on making a rhetorical war on Islam is seem as big problem. Bush's rapid dropping of crusader rhetoric and Obama's narrowing of the language of the GWOT to focus mainly on AQ had little to do with PC as Trump seems to assume. It was mainly about keeping Muslim allies on board. Trump's bellicose bigotry is already having an effect they say. It's being felt in very real way in place like Mosul with ISF soldiers who've long worked with the US questioning their role.
 

Notable for camera drone use and a really terrible video game like production style. Has a moment where a surviving IS fighter calmly sights up on the camera man. A bit gory at the end.

Lots of Iranian kit in use. Clearly well equipped. Kata'ib Hizbullah is one of the largest Iraqi IRGC backed militias. Listed as a terrorist group by the US. Also fought around Aleppo.
 
On War Is Boring Few Teenagers Radicalized Into ISIS Are Truly Loners
...
Of 34 I.S.-directed or inspired plots by teenagers in Western countries since September 2014, only 20 percent were truly solo, according to the report. More than 17 percent involved domestic terrorist cells without contact with the Islamic State, while 50 percent of the total involved electronic contact and another 11.8 percent involved direct, in-person contact.

“Therefore, the primary terror threat cannot be said to come from teenage loners,” [our emphasis] noted Robin Simcox, a counter-terrorism researcher at the Heritage Foundation and author of the report. “The dissemination of its propaganda online is part of the reason the Islamic State has been able to find unparalleled success with this demographic group,” Simcox added.

It may seem obvious, but it’s important for counter-terrorism work. While there is much attention given to social, psychological, ideological and even economic causes behind why people become terrorists — it’s also the case that for many impressionable would-be jihadists, they might not have radicalized if they simply hadn’t been lured in by somebody else.

Kill the recruiters, and there might be fewer recruits.
...
Click to expand...
A French IS recruiter. Parents memorise the telltale signs:
1*ewy385e_IIzXgkLWThZxdQ.jpeg

It occurs to me they may be missing the initial radicalisation via Pirates Of The Caribbean here.
 
On TI Defence The Big Spin: Corruption and the growth of violent extremism
Description

The Big Spin: Corruption and the growth of violent extremism finds that organisations including ISIS take advantage of corruption in their efforts to recruit and retain disillusioned members, even as they use corrupt practices to channel funds and smuggle arms, drugs, and people. Corruption also can dramatically weaken state institutions, rendering them ineffective in the face of the threat from extremist groups.

The research features a new analysis of post-revolutionary Libya, and the subsequent rise of militant groups. Of the 150 former and current fighters interviewed, almost two thirds believed the post-revolution period was no less corrupt than the Gaddafi era. Sources confirmed ISIS has engaged in bribery with officials in Libya and Egypt to exchange commodities, and has bought weapons using drugs, whilst ISIS members have been seen driving luxury cars in Libya.

Despite their own corrupt activities, a study of ISIS and their supporters’ social media posts found a repeated use of corruption in their public narratives. The strategy reflects public anger against abuse of power by corrupt elites, whilst positioning ISIS as the antidote. Foreign influences were also found to be targets of this rhetoric, to strengthen anti-invasion sentiment.
Click to expand...
One of the basic appeals of Salafi beliefs is that they provide a basis for purifying corrupt societies and the Greater ME has lots of those. It's interesting that IS simultaneously had no problem with large scale baksheesh and the odd bit of high living.

It occurs to me self righteous Western reactionaries often seem even more eager swamp dwellers than those they would topple.
 
On Millitary.com Strike on ISIS Drone Cell Highlights Airman's Novel Intel Methods
...
Zeroing In

The pilot and the sensor operator stayed on the vehicle where the drone was spotted, and began mapping its routine, Jamieson said.

The goal was to determine "is there a network going on?" Jamieson said. The next crew rotations for both the Predator and analysis teams were given permission to stay on the vehicle, as was the next day's crew.

"They were able to stay on the target," she said, "and they were working with the 363rd [ISR] Wing … an integrated DGS and targeting cell."

The unit is the Air Force's only wing focused on "content-dominant multi-intelligence analysis and targeting for five distinct mission sets: air defenses, counter-space, counter-ISR, theater ballistic missile and cruise missile threat, and air threat," according to the service.

The target and analysis cell portion re-examined the data to develop the target in coordination with teams already on hand tracking and disseminating details on the ISIS network.

It had been just 10 days from Jean's find to strike approval coordinated through the Joint Task Force, Jamieson said.

"On the 11th day, they went in on the strike," she said, and Langley stayed on the mission for processing, exploitation and dissemination, as well as battle damage assessment of the operation.

"They had the pattern of life knowledge," she said.

As a result, more than 10 facilities with pieces or parts of small drones controlled by ISIS were destroyed because "of one senior airman identifying a signal, and taking it through fruition because she said, 'The analysis I knew would prove out,' " Jamieson said of the conversation she had with the airman.
...
Click to expand...
Impressive, the density of jargon alone is awe inspiring.
 
Also via Air Wars:

On AlterNet Radioactive Weapons Are Killing Innocent Civilians in Iraq—and It's the US Military's Fault
...
Everyone Seems to be Dying of Cancer.

Evidence from Baghdad and Fallujah is compelling. Before she died of leukemia, artist Nuha al-Radi wrote, ‘Everyone seems to be dying of cancer. Every day one hears about another acquaintance or friend of a friend dying. How many more die in hospitals that one does not know? Apparently, over 30 per cent of Iraqis have cancer, and there are a lot of kids with leukemia. The depleted uranium left by the US bombing campaign has turned Iraq into a cancer-infested country’.

Dr. Samira Allani, a pediatric specialist at the Fallujah General Hospital, sees the connection between Iraq and Japan – two countries struck hard by weapons of mass destruction. The rate of children born with birth defects in Fallujah are much greater than that of children born – after 1945 – in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The dust from DU emits alpha radiation, which experts say is twenty times more dangerous than the gamma radiation from nuclear weapons. There was no dramatic mushroom cloud over Baghdad or Fallujah, but the smaller explosions might have been just as deadly.
...
Click to expand...
The Syrian journalist Hassan Hassan noted DU munitions were being used on his hometown recently.

Lots of folk die indirectly from warfare. Buggered water supplies are probably a bigger killer of kids than DU.
 
On TNI Slower May Be Better in Going at ISIS
...
Third, the ISIS problem will not go away when the mini-state is extinguished. The problem will continue in the form of the ideology and the inspiration, and probably also in the form of insurgency in the lands in which the mini-state has existed.

This last point leads to the further observation that as far as not only anti-Western terrorism but also instability in the Middle East are concerned, what matters most is not how hastily the ISIS mini-state is crushed but rather what arrangements are left on the ground after the crushing. The more that chaos, disputes, and uncertainty prevail there, the more that ground will remain fertile for violent extremism, whether under the ISIS label or some other brand. The rest of the political, diplomatic, and military story of conflict in Syria still has a good way to go before providing a more promising and stable alternative for what comes after ISIS. It would not be advantageous for the anti-ISIS military campaign to get ahead of that story. Speed in this case is not necessarily good.

All of this is in addition to one of the biggest downsides of U.S. forces assuming more of a military role: playing into the ideology and propaganda of ISIS and similar extremists, who appeal for support with a message about how the United States uses its armed might to intervene in Muslim lands and to kill Muslims.
...
Click to expand...
This has always been a problem with the GWOT. There's something essentially wrongheaded about pursuing a symptom now defined as "Radical Islamic Terrorism" rather than addressing causes. Stamping out one scary terror threat only to be confronted with more. It's also enormously self centred to think of this solely in terms of relatively slight threats to us while piles of Muslim skulls mount. The greater problem is instability in these parts of the world. And it can be argued the GWOT has actually worsened that.

IS's resurgence during the Arab Spring was partly facilitated by Obama's neglect of Iraq. The Bush administration at least felt it owned the mess it had made in Iraq. Obama treated it as a mistake somebody else made; a very Trumpian position. Hillary Clinton's promised Civilian Surge never happened. The US nagged by reckless allies was too busy with Libya and Syria. And finally blaming it all on the Iraqis defeated any learning of lessons. The US has basically ignored growing problems with Kurdish allies against IS. It's been less supportive of Baghdad struggling to balance growing Iranian influence than it should have been.

Trump's now far too focused on "bombing the shit out of IS" as he promised to rather than actually addressing what produced IS. In large part that's a very corrupt Iraqi state that's both oppressive and absent. And this problem is actually worse in Syria. In Iraq there is genuine popular will to improve this, fledgling institutions and the great moral force of Najaf. Squabbling Baghdad and currently strongman ruled Irbil may currently be broke also have vast oil wealth. They can eventually reconstruct the country. Then more broadly rent Sunni Arab complicity than they tried to before. Think of it as spreading the wealth. It won't ever be free of radical Salafi but there's hope it will be much better.

Syria looks far bleaker. The Assad's squat unshift-able on their rentier state like toad Kings. The long foreign backed revolt has rendered the Syrian state even more corrupt and less able to secure its territory. Useful Syria is practically occupied by the Iranians who fill Assad's begging bowl. The Russians are pursuing a brutal COIN strategy US experts regard as likely to be largely counterproductive in the longterm. Much of the rural areas are a stew rich with Takfiri. AQ now bears the flag of the anti-Assad cause. The upcoming Trump betrayal of the rebels is only going to make their message resonate more. Apoist Rojava may well take Raqqa but has enemies on ever side and looks doomed to be war torn.

And then there's Yemen an object lesson in failed too terror centric policy. That's spawned what may be AQ's most powerful affiliate and eventual new HQ.
 
On MEE CIA 'terrorist hunters' to quit in opposition to US president
...
"This was the generation of operatives who came about after the restructuring after George W Bush, to reclaim their credibility, to focus on the facts and not to massage them. Now they believe they are going to go back to square one," a source with knowledge of the resignations told MEE.

"The ramifications on society in the US and Europe will be substantial. These are people who know the terrain and who blend in. Some of them have been undercover for years. Now they all sent a message to Washington: 'We are quitting'."

The threatened resignation of two "terrorist hunters" in particular is a source of concern at the CIA's Langley headquarters, the source added.

"They are irreplaceable. Them quitting the business will harm the interests of the US. These two guys are responsible for 50 to 60 percent of the pre-emption of terrorist attacks you never hear about," the source said.

According to the source, the two agents were quitting for two main reasons.

As loyal Americans, they are disgusted by the low intellectual calibre of the leaders they now have to serve as well as their ideological bias against, and suspicion of Muslims in general.

They are frustrated by the new intelligence chiefs' ignorance of Islam, their inability to differentiate between different groups of Salafi-jihadists, and their propensity to lump all Islamist groups, both violent and non-violent, into one pot.

But as intelligence operatives, they are also concerned about a shift in priorities away from IS and al-Qaeda, to focus instead on ideological issues which are irrelevant to, or actively hamper, counter-intelligence.

They are "extremely concerned" that the leadership of the intelligence community has been put in the hands of former military generals, and their primary concern is to protect their intelligence assets and prevent them from being used to serve political purposes.
...
Click to expand...
It would surprise me if sharp end folk were quitting especially now Flynn is gone.
 
NoXion said:
Is he wearing eyeliner?!
Click to expand...
Yes, the fat git.

The Taliban also have a fondness for it I recall.
...
Instead of the trademark Taliban uniforms of turbans, eyeliner and flip-flops, these men wore Russian and Nato poncho raincoats over their shalwars, and boots and trainers. Most striking was the way they held their guns. Instead of carrying them in the standard militia style, on their shoulders or holding them like walking sticks, they wore them strapped around their chests, one hand by the trigger and the other holding the muzzle down. They stood just like the Americans.
...
Click to expand...
 
On Musings On Iraq Mosul Campaign Day 128, Feb 22, 2017
...
Everyday the militants are bombarding east Mosul with drones, mortars, and rockets. The press is covering fewer and fewer of these incidents, but that doesn't mean they’re not happening. The only casualties reported were 5 killed and 3 injured from a drone. Just as disconcerting was the fact that IS put up leaflets in a neighborhood telling people to leave otherwise they would be considered targets and be killed. Many IS members slipped into the civilian population of the city to hide, while others were a stay behind force to sow mischief. The ISF is trying to hunt them down, but there are increasing complaints about their heavy handedness, which might turn the population against them. At the same time, IS threats and intimidation are working towards the same goal. This could lead to a very dangerous and unstable situation once all of Mosul is taken.
...
Click to expand...
Worrying, you have to remember here IS has been a mafia like presence in Mosul for over a decade. It never went away and has areas of popular support especially amongst the rural poor who flooded in when the city fell to them. A city of 1.5 million with on paper a 60K strong constabulary force was never entirely secured.
 
On AP US changes rules of engagement for Mosul fight in Iraq
...
Just a few months ago, Lt. Col. Browning's phone conversation would have been impossible. Rather than request assistance directly, his call would have likely been routed through a joint command center much farther from the battle zone.

In the fight against the Islamic State group in Mosul, the United States has adjusted its rules of engagement as American and other international troops are now closer to front-line fighting than before.

During the push to take Mosul International Airport on Thursday, American and European advisers were embedded with forward Iraqi rapid response and special forces units.

Coalition officials say the changes are helping speed up Iraqi military gains, but they mark a steady escalation of U.S. involvement in Iraq that also reflects lingering shortcomings on the part of Iraq's armed forces and growing political and military pressure to finish the Mosul operation quickly.

"Usually I'm right by his side," Browning said between phone calls of his Iraqi army counterpart Brig. Gen. Khalifa. "When a threat comes in like this, we take it just as seriously as if we are under threat."

This closer relationship is new.
...
Click to expand...
The Kill Chain, as they call it, has been getting shorter for some time.
 
On BuzzFeedNews Trump’s Plans To Obliterate ISIS May Look A Lot Like Obama’s Strategy
...
The proposed changes appear largely to expand strategies the US is already using against the militant group. The Pentagon plan is expected to include at least three recommendations, including a push for roughly 1,000 US troops on the ground in Syria whose role will be largely the same as the US forces now supporting Iraqis in the battle for Mosul. That is, they would advise and support local troops as they march into ISIS territory, a defense official told BuzzFeed News. Most of the troops would be based at a military installation north of Raqqa, ISIS’s self-proclaimed capital in Syria.

“The instinct of the Pentagon, State Department, and Central Command is to say, ‘Here are some of the options: You could widen the aperture, deploy more forces,” said Andrew Exum, a former Pentagon official. “But overall it’s going to look like the Obama strategy. From the point of the view of the military, the strategy is working.”
...
Click to expand...
Well Trump's much ballyhooed secret plan to defeat IS turned out to be asking the Pentagon what they thought should be done so this is hardly a surprise.

In Iraq there's officially about a Brigade of US forces on the ground but it may be closer to two. There are also probably more US boots on grounds in Syria as well. I suspect this will creep up.
 
On War Is Boring The Assault on Albu Saif
...
Trundling back toward the blast wall, the ERD and Federal Police stop on a dusty patch of open ground, hidden from the village by a gently rising hilltop, and the vehicles slowly form into two columns.

Gunners carefully check their weapons. Not only do most of them have a vehicle-mounted heavy machine gun, they also have personal rifles, PKM machine guns and rocket-propelled grenade launchers.

The tips of weapons that make up a small arsenal poke into the sky, barely visible over the welded and bolted turret armor of the vehicles — each gunner is capable of putting down a significant amount of fire if needed.
...
Click to expand...
No shortage of equipment there. These Iraqi ERD guys look very well trained as well.

Long account of a small battle up by Mosul.

Interesting badge:
1*OujRP_3vr_oP2OfCj8nycA.jpeg
 
On Musings On Iraq Mosul Campaign Day 130, Feb 24, 2017
February 24 the Iraqi forces (ISF) secured the Mosul airport and Ghazlani camp and headed north into the city itself. The Golden Division secured Ghazlani, while the Federal Police and Rapid Reaction Division, supported by armor of the 9th Division did the same for Mosul airport. Large numbers of Islamic State fighters surrendered to the police at the airfield, something that has not really been reported before. This could point to the insurgents’ morale breaking. The Golden Division then moved into the Maamun Wadi Hajar neighborhoods to the northwest of Ghazlani. The two police units went for Hawl al-Josaq and Dandan, which are directly north of the airport, freeing the latter. The army’s 9th Division and the Hashd’s Al Abbas Division took Tal Ruman that is to the east of Maamun. The ISF were using bulldozers to make new roadways to avoid the main thoroughfares, which have been laced with IEDs. Moving to the outskirts of the city was relatively easy, but now the real fight is beginning as the ISF enter the Mosul itself.
...
Click to expand...
My bold, seems signifigant.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

tim
Bizarre acts of terrorism - statue of Lenin and Mao blown up in Texas.
Replies
3
Views
440
belboid
belboid
Bingoman
Turkish terror attack 23rd October 2024
Replies
4
Views
918
_Russ_
_Russ_
tim
State murder in Singapore.
Replies
21
Views
868
A380
A380
JimW
Indian state implicated in murder of Sikh activist in Canada
2
Replies
30
Views
2K
_Russ_
_Russ_
Pickman's model
fascist republican state legislators (usa)
Replies
0
Views
404
Pickman's model
Pickman's model
Back
Top Bottom