Category: Terror War

In Afghanistan, in the Ghazni province, Afghan military have been battling a fairly large force of Taliban for the last week or so. The Taliban has been doing what they do best – terrorizing the civilians with executions and beheadings. Villagers struck back this weekend when they hung four Talban terrorists from a tree, according to Reuters;

The hangings were carried out after Taliban fighters had killed more than 100 people in the area in the past week, including more than a dozen who were beheaded, according to Ghazni deputy governor Mohammad Ali Ahmadi.

The battle in the Ajrestan district of Ghazni, southwest of the capital Kabul, is part of an escalation of Taliban attacks around the country as the militants take advantage of dwindling U.S. air support as foreign forces leave.

I think that’s good news since the Afghans are putting a little more effort into their own well-being for a change.

The Washington Post publishes an opinion post from Rosa Brooks, a law professor at Georgetown who thinks that Obama’s promise of no “boots on the ground” is a bad idea, because it plays into ISIS’ hands;

I wonder what that pledge really means — and just why we’re supposed to find it reassuring. It’s a pledge that seems to have everything to do with politics and little to do with the imperatives of strategy or security.

Here’s what “no boots on the ground” apparently doesn’t mean: It doesn’t mean that no U.S. troops will be sent to Iraq or Syria. Reportedly there are already 1,600 U.S. military personnel in Iraq. True, they’re present in an “advisory” role, not in a combat role — but surely one lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan is that combat has a habit of finding its way to noncombat personnel. Enemy snipers and IEDs don’t much care about a soldier’s mission or occupational specialty, and you can bet that fighters of the self-proclaimed Islamic State would be content with the heads of a few American advisers.

Here’s a story from Stars & Stripes where that happened to some advisers in Afghanistan who hadn’t planned on being boots on the ground in a firefight against some Taliban fellows;

When early success against the militants left the Afghans with more territory than they could control, Gen. Abdul Raziq asked the Americans to cover for the last days of the mission.

The Americans agreed to help, and their advise-and-assist mission quickly turned to open combat.

“Our role wasn’t really to fight,” said Lt. Graham Hennig, a platoon leader with Dragon Troop. “It just so happened that the fight crept it’s way up to us.”

Yeah, that happens, and it will happen in Syria and Iraq. But the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Martin Dempsey says that his plan will involve training 15,000 Syrian rebels, so he doesn’t need American troops, well, except the American trainers, says Stars & Stripes;

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, made the assessment to reporters a week after Congress approved a plan to begin training and equipping 5,000 moderate Syrian rebels to take on the Islamic State, which has seized about a third of the territory in Syria and neighboring Iraq.

“Five thousand has never been the end state,” Dempsey said. “Twelve to 15,000 is what we believe they would need to recapture lost territory in eastern Syria” that the Islamic State controls.

Yeah, a few hundred advisers and several thousand rebels, with no real allegiance to anything in particular who are supposed to be married to the idea of defeating ISIS. By the way, the Syrian rebels, who are fighting the Syrian government are supposed to fight against ISIS who is also fighting against the Syrian government. And Dempsey says that one of the jobs those advisers will be taking on is to help form political loyalties among the rebels. While a Syrian government still exists. And the Iranian clients, Hezbollah are in that mix – the same Hezbollah who blames us for the existence of their mortal enemies, the Israelis. A perfect situation for a lot of green-on-blue deaths.

From KFOR in Oklahoma City comes the story of 30-year-old Alton Nolen who returned with a knife to the business where he’d just been fired;

He walked into the front office area where he met 54-year-old Colleen Hufford and began attacking her with a knife.

Sgt. Lewis confirms the type of knife used in the attack is the same kind used at the plant.

Lewis confirms that Hufford was stabbed several times and that Nolen “severed her head.”

At that point, Lewis claims Nolen met 43-year-old Traci Johnson and began attacking her with the same knife.

Officials say at that point, Mark Vaughan, an Oklahoma County reserve deputy and a former CEO of the business, shot him as he was actively stabbing Johnson.

“He’s a hero in this situation,” Sgt. Lewis said, referring to Vaughan. “It could have gotten a lot worse.”

Authorities say it appears Nolen was attacking employees at random.

According to KFOR, the FBI has taken over the investigation of the attack. It seems that Mr Nolan is a recent convert to Islam and spent his time at work trying to convert his fellow employees.

The other day we reported that the Army was sending a division headquarters to Iraq in order to manage activities there. Today, Chief tango sends us a link to the news that it’s 1st Infantry Division’s soldiers who are deploying from Fort Riley, Kansas according to The Army Times;

About 500 soldiers will deploy in late October to the Central Command area of operations, Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Adm. John Kirby said Thursday in a briefing with reporters.

About 200 of those soldiers will be in Iraq as part of the 475-troop increase announced Sept. 10 by President Obama, Kirby said.

Of that group, 138 will be in the Baghdad joint operations center, 68 in Irbil, and 10 at the Ministry of Defense in Baghdad, he said.

“They will have command and control of ongoing advise and assist efforts in support of Iraqi and Peshmerga forces, and continue to help us all degrade and destroy [the Islamic State],” Kirby said.

The remaining 300 soldiers from 1st Infantry Division headquarters will be based in the CENTCOM AOR; Kirby would not specify where they will be stationed. These soldiers will support the rest of the headquarters element, “but right now there’s no plan to put them inside Iraq,” Kirby said.

I’ve pretty much lost count – I think that will make almost two thousand “boots on the ground” – well, four thousand if we’re counting actual boots. It seems to be getting away from us, or getting away from someone. My brigade was attached to The Big Red One for Desert Storm, so my best wishes go with them.

Washington and its Arab allies killed scores of Islamic State fighters in the opening 24 hours of air strikes, the first direct U.S. foray into Syria two weeks after Obama pledged to hit the group on both sides of the Iraq-Syria border.

However, the intensifying advance on the northern town of Kobani showed the difficulty Washington faces in defeating Islamist fighters in Syria, where it lacks strong military allies on the ground.

“Those air strikes are not important. We need soldiers on the ground,” said Hamed, a refugee who fled into Turkey from the Islamic State advance.

Yeah, well, call some of those allies of ours who have been buying fighting vehicles, planes and tanks from us from decades and haven’t had the chance to use them until now. We’re busy else where and you had your chance using US troops.

The French government confirmed that Frenchman Hervé Gourdel was executed by the Islamic State-linked Algerians in the group Jund al-Khilafah, according to Fox News;

In the video, masked gunmen pledged their allegiance to the leader of the Islamic State group, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, and said they were fighting his enemies. They criticized the French attacks in Iraq as well as its intervention against radical Islamists in Mali.

“Our values are at stake,” French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said Wednesday after hearing about the video. He would not comment further, but minutes earlier he insisted that France would continue fighting in Iraq as long as necessary.

Algerian police and soldiers had been combing the imposing Djura Djura mountains on Tuesday in the search for Groudel.

To his credit, French President Francois Hollande promised that France won’t deviate from supporting the fight against the Islamic State;

“As grave as the situation is, we will give in to no blackmail, no pressure, no ultimatum,” he said. “No terrorist group can in any way influence France’s position, will, and freedom.”

“I repeat it here … we will continue to provide our support to the Iraqi authorities,” said Hollande. That would include weapons deliveries to those fighting the Islamic State group and continued air support for Iraqi troops and Kurdish Peshmerga forces, he said.