This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Terror War

  • Condom bombs?

    Condom bombs?

    Condom bombs

    Chief Tango sends us a link from Popular Science which links to Russia Insider, which, in turn, links to a UK Sunday Express article for a weird story about anti-Assad rebels in Syria defending against aircraft by releasing explosive devices into the airspace over their positions, explosives inside condoms with some lighter-than-air gas.

    I’m not sure how much I believe this story, but then I’ve been known to underestimate the stupidity of people in that region in the past. Russia Insider seems to think that this will wipe out the Russian Air Force over Syria.

    A week from now, when all of Russia’s warplanes in Syria are blown out of the sky, Putin will scratch his head and think to himself: Why didn’t I consider the threat of explosive, floating condoms?

    What goes up, must come down.

  • Video of hostage release

    Video of hostage release

    Hostage rescue

    One of our friends at SOCOM sent us a link to what is supposedly helmet-cam footage taken by peshmerga troops of the hostage rescue the other day which cost MSG Wheeler his life in Northern Iraq;

  • Taliban stranded on an island

    Reuters reports that several dozen Taliban fighters are stranded on an island in the Amu River between TurkeyTurkmenistan and Afghanistan. The Taliban deny that they’re stranded, but that’s pretty typical of them.

    “They have no choice but to surrender or starve,” [a spokesman for Vice President General Abdul Rashid Dostum] said, adding that Afghan troops had not advanced so as not to enter Turkmenistan.

    A Taliban spokesman denied its fighters were marooned, saying they were basing themselves on the Afghan side of the island to stage their fight against government forces.

    Afghanistan’s vice president has been leading about 2,000 Afghan troops in the northern province of Jawzjan against the insurgents making a broad push across the north of the country.

    Maybe they can send in Delta to “rescue” them, you know, since Delta seems to be in the area.

  • Mission creep in Iraq

    Mission creep in Iraq

    Joshua L. Wheeler

    In NBC, they pay tribute to Master Sergeant Joshua Wheeler, the 39-year-old senior NCO who was killed in a raid on ISIS last week while assigned to the Army’s “Delta” unit. The article says that Wheeler “rushed into action” when he heard gunfire in the prison.

    Those actions, Defense Secretary Ash Carter told reporters on Friday, weren’t part of the original rescue mission plan, but were critical to its success.

    “I am immensely proud of this young man,” Carter said adding that his thoughts and prayers go out to Wheeler’s family.

    Earlier Friday, Defense officials confirmed to NBC News Wheeler, 39, as the American Delta Force commando killed in a rescue mission in Iraq on Thursday.

    In a late night email, COB6 reminded us that Delta doesn’t “train and advise” foreign fighters like the President tells us why we have folks deployed to Iraq – that’s the job of special forces – the force mutipliers. Delta pulls triggers – that’s their only job and that’s why they’re so good at it.

    Carter said that the military expects “more raids of this kind” and that the rescue mission “represents a continuation of our advise and assist mission.”

    This may mean some American soldiers “will be in harm’s way, no question about it,” Carter said.

    So, it must be 1993 all over again. I just watched Carter say that Wheeler witnessed the unit he was advising and assisting come under fire and he rushed to help them. Well, then they must have changed the mission of Delta. Or, more likely, Carter lied about Wheeler and Delta’s presence in the theater.

  • One American killed in hostage rescue in Iraq

    One American killed in hostage rescue in Iraq

    According to CNN, an American was killed in an otherwise successful rescue of more than 70 hostages from ISIS;

    Seventy hostages were liberated in the operation, which involved U.S. special operations troops as well as Kurdish and Iraqi forces, U.S. officials said.

    The operation took place in Hawija in northern Iraq, one U.S. source said.

    From Business Insider;

    The raid was directed against an ISIS run prison to the east of Hawija and featured American helicopters and airstrikes, The New York Times reports citing unnamed Iraqi officials. During the operation Kurdish forces took the lead while US Special Forces and airstrikes provided support.

    According to the Iraqi officials, the raid resulted in the freeing of the Kurdish prisoners and the capture of several senior ISIS militants. The Times reports that two unnamed US military officials confirmed the general outline of the operation.

  • The A-10 goes to Turkey

    The A-10 goes to Turkey

    A10 Thunderbolt

    Air Force Chief of Staff General Mark Welsh A. Welsh III visited Hill Air Force Base in Utah last week to visit that white elephant the F35. While he was there he said this according to the Standard Examiner;

    According to a report from the base’s 75th Air Base Wing, Welsh told the Hill group the A-10, while long-beloved, needs to be retired.

    “The A-10 will not be used in a high threat environment,” Welsh said. “Seventy percent of the A-10s we used during the first Gulf War suffered battle damage. It’s a rugged airplane, but it’s not hard to hit.”

    So, we fast forward to this week where AFP reports that 12 A-10 Thunderbolts (Warthogs) have deployed to Incirlik, Turkey to take part in the war against ISIS;

    The 12 planes, famed for their tank-destroying capabilities, arrived over the weekend and have already been scheduled to fly missions in support of the US-led coalition fighting Islamic State jihadists in Iraq and Syria, the official told AFP.

    Speaking on condition of anonymity, he said the move had “added capability” to the coalition’s efforts against IS.

    If the Air Force had their way, the A-10 would have disappeared before Desert Storm even started, but here it is, 24 years later, a week after the Chief of Staff said they were useless on the modern battlefield going back into battle. Reality always bites the Pentagon-types right in their collective ass.

  • Uruguayans fed up with Syrian ingrates

    Uruguayans fed up with Syrian ingrates

    Last year, the Uruguayan government announced their largely symbolic plans to take in five families of Syrian refugees. Folks in the coastal fishing village of Juan Lacaze pulled together their meager resources to help one such family. The government gave them a home and a monthly stipend and the community offered them jobs. They’ve been rewarded with nothing but complaints from the Syrians.The father of the family went so far as to threaten self-immolation. According to the Associated Press;

    “I like Uruguay. I like Uruguayan families. My young children all go to school here,” Alshebli said in halting Spanish, standing in the living room of his sparsely furnished, multi-room home on the outskirts of Juan Lacaze. “But food is very expensive. How can I feed 15 children?”

    He showed The Associated Press a two-month winter electricity bill totaling $475 and said everyone in the family who is able works. For example his 19-year-old daughter Nada sells Arab food downtown and recently worked in an assisted living facility, but earned just $68 in a little under a month there.

    Alshebli also complained that the government won’t let him farm beyond the modest vegetable garden the family has planted.

    “No sheep. No cows. No land,” said Alshebli, recounting what he said officials told him.

    I’d stop making children, to start with, but that’s just me. On the upside though, no one is shooting at them – and that’s what the Syrians wanted to escape, right? That’s what all of the European government and news are telling us. The Syrians are not economic refugees, I’m told.

    Seventy-two more families were scheduled to arrive in Uruguay this year, but they’ve been no-shows. I think Uruguay dodged that bullet.

  • Docs Without Borders claim Kunduz hospital bombing was intentional

    The Associated Press reports that Doctors Without Borders is charging that the bombing of their hospital last week in Kunduz, Afghanistan by US aircraft was intentional;

    The trauma hospital was bombed during a firefight between Taliban and government troops, as U.S. advisers were helping Afghan forces retake the city after the insurgents overran it and seized control on Sept. 28.

    […]

    Doctors Without Borders officials have said the U.S. gunship made five separate strafing runs over the course of an hour, directing heavy fire on the main hospital building, which contained the emergency room and intensive care unit.

    If the Afghan government hadn’t given up the city in the first place, taking it back from the Taliban wouldn’t have been necessary. Given that the Taliban is well-known for hiding behind innocents while prosecuting their war against civilians and Doctors Without Borders’ history of siding with terrorists, it makes sense to me that the hospital was probably a legitimate target.

    While it shouldn’t be US policy to bomb hospitals, it should send a message to these thugs that their days of hiding behind innocents have ended. The President has apologized for the incident, but only because he can blame the troops for the bombing. he certainly hasn’t taken responsibility for it.

    From another AP link;

    White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Obama offered condolences to the staff and pledged a “transparent, thorough and objective accounting of the facts.”

    According to Doctors Without Borders, US special forces troops had scrutinized the hospital in the days before the attack, so I’m pretty sure that they had their reasons for targeting the hospital.