Pentagon: Maybe the Yazidis don’t need rescuing after all
Fox News reports that the Pentagon says that when there were boots on the ground on Mount Sanjar, they discovered that there are far fewer Yazidis than they initially thought, so maybe they don’t need to be rescued;
Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby said late Wednesday that a team of military personnel had “assessed that there are far fewer Yazidis there than previously feared” and those who remain are “in better condition than previously believed and continue to have access to the food and water we dropped.”
As a result, Kirby said, officials had “determined that an evacuation mission is far less likely.”
Jennifer Griffin, on the Fox News broadcast channel said that the Pentagon’s big problem was that the folks in Iraq didn’t know where they could put the Yazidis once they rescued them. I have trouble believing that those folks on Mount Sanjar were facing death a few hours ago and now suddenly, they’re fine. Maybe if the President spends some more time on vacation, all of the world’s problems will resolve themselves.
BBC says;
US officials suggested that air-strikes in the region had created an escape route for thousands, who had managed to leave the mountain over the past few nights, helped by Kurdish fighters.
Meanwhile, according to al Jazeera, the united nations has declared a state of emergency in Iraq because of 400,000 refugees and fighting has erupted today in Fallujah, once again.
Fighting erupted early on Thursday in the rebel-held city of Fallujah, about 65km west of Baghdad.
The clashes on the city’s northern outskirts killed four children, along with a woman and at least 10 fighters, said Fallujah hospital director Ahmed Shami. Fallujah has been in the hands of the Islamic State since early January, when the group seized much of Western Anbar province along with parts of the provincial capital of Ramadi.
The fighting came as the UN declared the situation in Iraq a “Level 3 Emergency” – a development that will trigger additional goods, funds and assets to respond to the needs of the displaced, said UN special representative Nickolay Mladenov, pointing to the “scale and complexity of the current humanitarian catastrophe.”
So, the UN is on the job. We can all relax now.
Category: Terror War, United Nations
Whaaaaaat? I thought there were “no boots on the ground”….???
Maybe we should name this the *Bergdahl syndrome*…..You know: at death’s door one minute, and in perfect robust health the next..Yes, of course, I am being sarcastic, but I am beyond pissed off with the amateurs in the WH (and on the frigging golf course.
They only put boots on the ground, in order to determine a way out of actually putting boots on the ground…
We are using a bit of Neville Chamberlain style approach here. Now please, bury your head in the sand and all will be well with the world.
Word.
I, for one, feel better knowing the U.N is on top of this one. Look out now ISIS.
“assessed that there are far fewer Yazidis there than previously feared”
Well of course there are fewer now…they’ve been under systematic slaughter for a while. It doesn’t take long to reduce a civilian population that is unarmed.
Nice to see the long range planning of the last 14 years finally paying a dividend with a stable, self-governing nation of cooperative endeavor by the various groups of tolerant, peaceful muslims.
VOV…Thank you. So just like kidnapped girls in Africa, I guess 1000 or less is the cut off point for protection and evacuation. 1001 and we are a go. 1000, uhm, not so much. Obama doesn’t know whether to shot or go blind about anything except which golf club to use and where the best vacation spots are. With his worthless, laughable SoS and now the ass kissers in the Pentagon telling him, “It’s okay Chief, whatever you decide is good for us. If it costs American lives, well that’s what THEY’RE there for. Not us of course. If it costs all the remaining Yazidis, well you can’t say you didn’t try and your intentions were good. Besides Chief, like you said, if it hadn’t been for Bush none of this would be happening, right”.
Ass holes, every one of them from the Oval Office to every member of his administration with permission to speak to him.
I meant “shit or go blind”, sorry.
If anything, this is the best possible argument for HUMINT – we have become slaves to the idea that with photographic and signals intelligence, we can know everything. The only reliable intel is a synthesis of ALL available intel.
The alternate possibility is that someone looked at the map, then though, “Holy crap, how are we gonna evacuate that many folks by air with no bases nearby and without putting massive local security in place?” – and they’re now backpedaling.
My hope is dat information is dis-information (so ISIS will not try to show up with RPGs and SA-7s when the aircraft are in transit).
I read days ago that like half of them fled into Syria. I also read that ISIS has surrounded Baghdad in preparation for an assault.
*popcorn*
I heard the British are going to go ahead and conduct the rescue…another Global leadership missed opportunity to our current POTUS.
I heard that if you pass ‘GO’, you collect $200.
What? Oh! Wrong game! Sorry.
I think this is just an excuse to say ‘See, I said no boots on the ground and I meant it, so we’re done with all of that. We can go home now. I still have four holes to play.’
(Didn’t say whose, did I? No, I was being nice. 🙂 )
And if the ISers have slacked off a bit, they are most likely having a confab on how to hit and take over Baghdad, and where to get more ammo for the weapons they stole.
Here’s a news story from Reuters regarding the ‘heads up’ from someone in Iraq who says he’s assured that the US will be involved in fighting the ISers.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/14/us-iraq-security-usa-military-idUSKBN0GD1KS20140814?feedType=RSS&feedName=worldNews&rpc=76
There is a link to the story about ISers massing around Baghdad in the sidebar of the article.