Report: ISIS leader may be badly wounded or dead—or maybe not either
This sort of report reminds me of the days when we’d get bulletins that Bin Laden had been wounded or killed.
They were never true—until one day they were.
So there is no way to tell about this:
The leader of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, was “critically wounded” when a U.S.-led air strike targeted the western Iraqi border town of al-Qaim, tribal sources told Al Arabiya News Channel on Saturday.
U.S. Central Command confirmed in a statement that U.S.-led air strikes targeted ISIS leaders near their northern Iraqi hub of Mosul late Friday, without confirming whether Baghdadi was killed, AFP reported.
I suspect they have not confirmed it officially because they actually have not confirmed it at all. There are some US “advisors” in Iraq, and there must be some intelligence from Iraqi sources, but how good it is on a subject like this is anyone’s guess. Of course, the strike location would have been based on intelligence in the first place.
It seems a bit more certain that a key aide to al Baghdadi was killed in the strike. But rest assured that none of this will stop ISIS:
The news came as Britain’s chief of the defence staff, General Sir Nick Houghton, said on Sunday that the Isis leadership would regenerate itself even if Baghdadi had been killed. In a sign that the UK believed there was a strong chance Baghdadi died in the air strikes, Houghton spoke of “potential death” as he said it would take some days for the US to confirm whether the Isis leader was alive or not…
But Houghton said Isis would fight back if its leader had been killed: “What I wouldn’t want to do is rush to the sense that the potential death of one of their totemic leaders is going to create some strategic reverse within Isis. They will regenerate leadership ”¦ because of the current potential attractiveness of this warped ideology.
ISIS is totally aware of NSA/ GCHQ thanks to Snowden.
So their top leadership stays off the radio.
I’d expect that he was profiled.
Like other tyrants, he just can’t travel in small company, for he’d surely be assassinated: the Pablo Escobar ending.
For some reason Obama seems to be serious about ISIS, we have troops on the ground to help target our airstrikes, and our soldiers are working with the Kurds. Working with the Kurds is a big deal for Obama since his special Islamic friend, Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, considers the Kurds his enemies. The fact that Obama is willing to defy his friend’s wishes and to help the Kurds fight ISIS means that somehow ISIS has managed to upset Obama.
If Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is dead, that will be a severe blow to Isis. Their leadership might reconstitute itself, but the movement will probably lose its edginess. It will be interesting to see how ISIS changes with different leadership. The new leadership will still be Islamists so they will still be just as committed to Islamic supremacy including the destruction of infidels everywhere in the World. The Yazidis and Christians are more readily available so they will bear the brunt of ISIS’s wrath. In the future ISIS might more discrete in their crimes against other Muslims, although the beheadings and slave trafficking will undoubtedly continue. They may seek out other Islamists as allies like Tayyip Erdogan or Al Qaeda or both.
Illuninati,
Obama is getting so much pressure from the military and foreign countries, and ISIS is one story even the MSM covers, so the present vote doesn’t work here.
I personally would like to drop enormous quantities of liquefied pig excrement on them and then ask their recruits how the 72 virgins would receive them if they smell like s**t. I am somewhat serious about this. We need to find a way to ridicule their self image as brave warriers. Just because they can kill women and kids, doesn’t make them strong.
ISIS is a threat to Shia Iran’s allies in Syria and Iraq. It isn’t rocket science to assume that Obama’s seriousness has everything to do with his pathetic and fake attempt to make a deal with the mullahs.
“’tis but a scratch”
“Just a flesh wound”
Monty Python-The Black Knight
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKhEw7nD9C4
If al-Baghdadi has been slain, it will likely degrade ISIS’ strategic capabilities. Which is what truly separates ISIS from al Qaeda. ISIS wishes to create a Sunni version of Iran and that is a much greater existential threat to the West than is a terrorist organization like al Qaeda.
Obama is more ‘concerned’ about ISIS because polls show that “security moms” are turning on him. So while Obama would love to get the Iranians more actively involved in fighting ISIS and is trying to use his coming ‘agreement’ with Iran as leverage, he’s already signaled that he accepts their acquiring nuclear weapons capability. Which of course cancels out any leverage with the Iranians.
I agree with expat regarding fighting Islamic ‘extremism’ with ‘pigs’. You create leverage with an opponent by credibly threatening what they value most and for Islamic jihadists, it is entrance into paradise that they value most.
You gain credibility by operating within your opponents own world view (their internal OODA Loop) and then using their own beliefs against them. ALL Islamic extremists are by definition, devout Muslims. They believe that pigs are ‘unclean’, as has been directly declared by Allah and thus, a fundamental barrier to entrance into paradise.
So, a West serious about fighting Islamic ‘extremism’ would issue its soldiers special hollow point ammo, the interior of which is coated with dried pigs blood. It would execute all captured Islamic terrorists by drowning them in a vat of pig’s blood. No more paradise = greatly diminished incentive. Imagined ‘reward’ is now balanced by (for them) unimaginable risk…
Not sure you could convince the likely ISIS recruits that killing women and kids doesn’t make you strong. It sure shows you’re stronger than somebody–the women and kids–and you get to posture as a death bringer. Hard to feature this attracts some guys but we’ve seen it forever.
I like the picky virgins theme better.
As others have pointed out, there is not much glory in killing women and children. For the true savage, there is nothing more glorious than killing a man and then enslaving his family. That is where ISIS rises to it’s true Islamic glory. Selling Christian and Yazidi women as sex slaves – now there is where a savage man can triumph completely over his captives.
It is impossible for even the most “moderate” Muslim to condemn Isis for reviving slavery since Islam has a long and proud tradition of enslaving other people. Islam is a religion which grew up in the shadow of the Christian Roman empire in Constantinople. In many ways Islam is a mirror image of Christianity only the morality in Islam is inverted. Islam has replaced Jesus with Mohammad as the perfect example of how to obey Allah. Whereas Jesus was a Jewish ascetic who preached peace and love, Mohammad was a desert brigand who gloried in robbery, murder and slave trading. It is impossible for any Muslim to brand slavery, especially sex slavery, as immoral since Mohammad enslaved many women himself and made provisions for sex slaves in the Koran.
ISIS is NOT killing women and children for glory. They are killing women and children to intimidate and terrorize.
It’s working: “Sharia law or gay marriage critics would be branded ‘extremists’ under Tory plans”
“New UK law would ban critics of Sharia from broadcasting, protesting or even posting messages on Facebook”
Geoffrey Britain Says:
“New UK law would ban critics of Sharia from broadcasting, protesting or even posting messages on Facebook”
I don’t know if the authorities are acting from fear or if they support Sharia law because the Islamists are their allies.
Nits make lice and lice make nits. Its merely a question of the west killing them and destroying islam in general or them tearing down the last vestiges of western civilization. This is a fight that has no end until one side or the other is ashes and dust.
Islamic Jihad cannot be defeated until the logistics are secured from Leftist raids or control.