The Islamic state

[butchersapron]

Of course, I'm just surprised that the communication links are that good.

Well - any stories of special forces put in? Journos. fighters, anyone? Can't see any. Stories of growing understanding of what role each plays adding up to heightened effectiveness - check.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Of course, I'm just surprised that the communication links are that good.

Some of the kurdish fighters have complained about poor communications with the US and their coalition pals but that's more about messages not being acted on than not getting through at all. If you've got a radio and some form of electricity, you can communicate. These YPG folk clearly know what they're doing, I'm sure they can work a radio.

 

[miss direct]

Apparently the barbers in the South East are really busy as a lot of men with beards are getting them cut as they're being mistaken for members of ISIS.

 

[Teaboy]

Well - any stories of special forces put in? Journos. fighters, anyone? Can't see any. Stories of growing understanding of what role each plays adding up to heightened effectiveness - check.

No, you're right no stories of the sort, although thats usually the lot of a special forces operative. That being said I respect what you're saying, for some reason I'm surprised how good communication links are between the US and the kurds, awful lot of trust there.

 

[8ball]

Apparently the barbers in the South East are really busy as a lot of men with beards are getting them cut as they're being mistaken for members of ISIS.

The reports of peak beard weren't far off, I guess.

 

[SpookyFrank]

for some reason I'm surprised how good communication links are between the US and the kurds, awful lot of trust there.

Well it seemed to take them a while to get everything running smoothly but good co-operation doesn't happen overnight.

The parameters are still pretty fucked up though. The US can drop bombs on ISIS but they can't parachute in supplies or materiel for the kurds, never mind special forces.

e2a: ISIS might have some AA capability though, meaning it's a lot easier to fire missiles from high altitude than to come in low to drop supplies.

 

[DotCommunist]

brecher on why kobane hasn't fallen. I think he has a point with point 1- this is presumably the first time IS have faced a defended territory by motivated and well led/trained opposition. A series of easy victories early on.

 

[butchersapron]

brecher on why kobane hasn't fallen. I think he has a point with point 1- this is presumably the first time IS have faced a defended territory by motivated and well led/trained opposition. A series of easy victories early on.

The last two pieces i linked to him on this thread turned out to be utter bullshit (ISIS will melt when they meet the peshmerga/ooh nothing happening at Kobane). Both total misreadings. Don't jinx the fighters.

 

[inva]

brecher on why kobane hasn't fallen. I think he has a point with point 1- this is presumably the first time IS have faced a defended territory by motivated and well led/trained opposition. A series of easy victories early on.

I think that tank video which seems to be his main evidence that IS aren't up to much was discussed earlier on this thread and it turned out to be from a different battle

 

[DotCommunist]

I think that tank video which seems to be his main evidence that IS aren't up to much was discussed earlier on this thread and it turned out to be from a different battle

thought that bit rang a bell.

 

[Patteran]

Another John Cantlie video has been released. I won't link to it, but it's marked up as Episode 4 out of 8.

 

[Patteran]

Found another great pic earlier as well:

A bit of revolutionary continuity in the face of attacks on theatre and that ISIS lot.

 

[coley]

The last two pieces i linked to him on this thread turned out to be utter bullshit (ISIS will melt when they meet the peshmerga/ooh nothing happening at Kobane). Both total misreadings. Don't jinx the fighters.

Don't know about the two previous but he is spot on in your link, liked the end piece esp,

"And for all sorts of tangential reasons, from DC politics to jihadist incompetence, they won. It’s the kind of story that keeps me writing war stories. War is horrible, boring and mean and stupid; it’s that woman’s head, carried by an IS goblin grinning like an idiot. But sometimes—very rarely, actually—people who’ve been pushed into war against their will come out of it as something more than the rest of us. Kobane was just another dusty town when Syria blew up a few years ago. No one in Kobane was strutting around trying to be a hero, which is more than you can say about the Ali-Jihadis in IS. All the Kurds of Kobane were trying to do was keep their town alive. And, to everyone’s surprise—and most of the big players’ annoyance—they succeeded. It’s the rarest thing in the world, a truly heroic story. But that’s what this is, and you can’t do much but be awed by it."

 

[coley]

View attachment 62534

Aw, behave, don't reduce this thread to vacuousness,,ta

 

[Patteran]

I wasn't trying to be vacuous. A pic was posted of a revolutionary theatre company in Kobane - the antithesis of the often-irrelevant left-wing theatre groups that we know in the UK, & it seemed to me to be a rare, genuine example of what Ewan MacColl called Theatre of Action. I didn't want to derail, so I posted a contextual image.

 

[coley]

I wasn't trying to be vacuous. A pic was posted of a revolutionary theatre company in Kobane - the antithesis of the often-irrelevant left-wing theatre groups that we know in the UK, & it seemed to me to be a rare, genuine example of what Ewan MacColl called Theatre of Action. I didn't want to derail, so I posted a contextual image.

Sorry, art and theatre are slightly out of sync on this thread, appreciate the sentiment, but as has been asked, try to keep it focused on the IS,
Guilty of being sidetracked mesel, no big deal

 

[DownwardDog]

Gregg's in Lincoln puts on an extra shift for the fat lads in the portakabin as the Stabbed Cats get in the fight.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-deploys-reaper-to-the-middle-east

This MQ-9 deployment actually makes a lot more sense than the Tornado GR4 Antiques Roadshow we've had up to now.

 

[kebabking]

Gregg's in Lincoln puts on an extra shift for the fat lads in the portakabin as the Stabbed Cats get in the fight....

look, there's nothing cushy about sitting in an air-conditioned office in a growbag scoffing a Burger King and surfing the net for niche porn you know...

the Royal Auxiliary Balloon Corps - see the world: on the telly.

 

[Patteran]

“After a one-month resistance we have launched a step-by-step advance towards victory. In the last week in particular Kobanê has become a graveyard for ISIS.”
Confident, optimistic statement from a YPG commander in Kobane that also refutes the story run by Iraqi-Kurdish news outlet Rudaw that 'at least six' YPG combatants were killed in the US airstrikes.

http://en.firatajans.com/news/news/...are-close-to-victory.htm#.VEDhWJPCWwQ.twitter

 

[coley]

“After a one-month resistance we have launched a step-by-step advance towards victory. In the last week in particular Kobanê has become a graveyard for ISIS.”
Confident, optimistic statement from a YPG commander in Kobane that also refutes the story run by Iraqi-Kurdish news outlet Rudaw that 'at least six' YPG combatants were killed in the US airstrikes.

http://en.firatajans.com/news/news/...are-close-to-victory.htm#.VEDhWJPCWwQ.twitter

Ta, good bit of news.

 

[J Ed]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/17/mideast-crisis-jets-idUSL6N0SC1UA20141017?irpc=932

Oct 17 (Reuters) - Iraqi pilots who have joined Islamic State in Syria are training members of the group to fly in three captured fighter jets, a group monitoring the war said on Friday, saying it was the first time that the militant group had taken to the air.
The group, which has seized land in Syria and Iraq, has been flying the planes over the captured al-Jarrah military airport east of Aleppo, said Rami Abdulrahman, who runs the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Reuters was not immediately able to verify the report.
U.S-led forces are bombing Islamic State bases in Syria and Iraq. The group has regularly used weaponry captured from the Syrian and Iraqi armies and has overrun several military bases but this was the first time it had been able to pilot warplanes.
"They have trainers, Iraqi officers who were pilots before for (former Iraqi president) Saddam Hussein," Abdulrahman said.
"People saw the flights, they went up many times from the airport and they are flying in the skies outside the airport and coming back," he said, citing witnesses in northern Aleppo province near the base, which is 70 km (45 miles) south of Turkey.

 

[likesfish]

Not for long uncle SAMs billion dollar f22's have to justify their exsistance somehow

 

[Pickman's model]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/17/mideast-crisis-jets-idUSL6N0SC1UA20141017?irpc=932

it's one thing to have the pilots to train them but they'd need a load of ground crew to help out with things like engine trim and so on. i wonder how eager those sorts of people would be to help out.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

Not for long uncle SAMs billion dollar f22's have to justify their exsistance somehow

Probably looking forwards to it... Not often they get a chance to shoot down other aircraft (although I'm guessing they will be destroyed on the ground)

 

[likesfish]

It depends how much they hate the pilot
the Iraqi airforce was never brilliant losing a mig to an Iranian Huey corbra takes some doing.
Taking some badly maintained piece of crap into the air with over a 100 of the latest fast jets flying about the place and a few of the uber f22 looking to get an air to air kill is a ticket to paradise rather than of any military use.

 

[Dogsauce]

Let them play with the planes for a bit, keeping them airborne will suck in a lot of resources and effort.

 

[DownwardDog]

Let them play with the planes for a bit, keeping them airborne will suck in a lot of resources and effort.

I doubt the plan is to contest air dominance in any way. It's more likely they'll be used for Leonidas Squadron/Selbstopfereinsätze type operations. That's if they get any of them working. The Fishbed and Flogger were never exactly paragons of reliability even with an endless slave army of commie conscripts to fettle them. So a jihadi whose previous technical experience was on the PAYG counter of Phones4U in West Ruislip is going to have a struggle on his hands.

 

[Dandred]

Why don't ISIS just get some Ebola blood and spray it around some international airports?

lots of terror! Unless terror isn't aim!

 

[coley]

5 on trial for plotting to kill troops or police in London!

 

[DotCommunist]

5 on trial for plotting to kill troops or police in London!

no sign that they are IS though?