France and their “merciless response”
Yesterday, François Hollande, the French president promised that the attacks in Paris on Friday night would earn ISIS a “merciless response” from the French people. So, according to the Wall Street Journal, they dropped 20 bombs on ISIS last night;
For France, the strikes were a major escalation in its air campaign. While involving far fewer aircraft than the U.S. used in the opening night of the American-led strikes in Syria last year, the bombing campaign was a significant use of the combat power France has in the region.
Sunday’s strikes followed a U.S. decision to expand intelligence sharing with France in support of the retaliatory bombings of Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq, officials said.
So, let me get this straight; the US knew where these targets were on Thursday, but they hadn’t taken action? See, that’s not how you fight these animals of ISIS. When you verify a target, you destroy it, right then. You don’t wait around until it gives you a political advantage to destroy it. Also, the US hasn’t been sharing targeting information with the French until now? WTAF? And, by the way, 20 bombs is not “merciless” – unless the media misinterpreted the president’s speech and he meant that he wasn’t going to say “merci”.
So, while France was dropping their twenty bombs on actual ISIS personnel, what was the US doing? According to AFP, they took out 116 fuel trucks – not a very cost-effective endeavor.
Strikes by the US-led air coalition fighting the Islamic State group destroyed 116 fuel trucks used by the jihadist organisation in eastern Syria, the Pentagon said on Monday.
In a statement, the Pentagon said the trucks were destroyed in a single strike on Sunday near Albu Kamal, an IS-held town in Deir Ezzor province along Syria’s border with Iraq.
[…]
“Our spokesperson Colonel (Steve) Warren previously stated that we were going to start going after ISIL’s financial abilities,” the spokesman said.
“This strike was part of that strategy to start degrading their financial ability.”
Unless those fuel trucks were bound for Europe and to be used a bombs, I have to ask “why?” Sure I understand how cutting their supply systems makes fighting against ISIS easier for the peshmerga and Iraqi troops, but, so does killing huge numbers of ISIS soldiers. Obviously, if we know where the fuel trucks are, we know where the staging areas for ISIS soldiers are located. The war won’t end until all of the ISIS troops are dead. Every last one. Destroying fuel supplies worked against mechanized units of the Germans in World War Two, but it will do little to stop the foot soldiers of the Islamic State.
Category: Terror War
after watching his speech in TV this morning I fell asleep more of the same ole BS
and yes we do know a lot more Intel but why would this current administration do anything anyways they can’t even lead unless it’s to cause strife here in the US…
Destroying trucks will slow down the foot soldiers as well if they are carrying food and water!!
The US usually gets one truck at a time:
Strikes in Syria
Fighter and remotely piloted aircraft conducted six strikes in Syria:
— Near Hasakah, two strikes struck two separate ISIL tactical units and destroyed an ISIL vehicle.
— Near Raqqah, one strike produced inconclusive results.
— Near Mara, one strike destroyed an ISIL improvised explosive device cluster, an ISIL fighting position and two ISIL defensive berms.
— Near Hawl, one strike struck an ISIL tactical unit and destroyed an ISIL checkpoint and wounded an ISIL fighter.
— Near Dayr Az Zawr, one strike struck an ISIL cash distribution site.
http://www.defense.gov/News-Article-View/Article/628972/us-coalition-continue-strikes-against-isil-in-syria-iraq?source=GovDelivery
They’re crowing about destroying two berms? I’m so glad millions of my taxpayer dollars are paying to landscape Bumfuck, Syria. It’s pretty fucking sad when they brag about blowing up mounds of dirt like it’s an accomplishment.
Reminds me of this:
Excuse me, Mr. Moderator, but you’re using common sense and you tell us that you expect ‘those people’ to do the same thing. While I appreciate your positive attitude, it conflicts with their golf and tennis dates.
In other news, Osama celebrates Paris victory:
Detainee Transfers Announced
The Department of Defense announced today the transfer of Ali Ahmad Muhammad al-Razihi, Khalid Abd-al-Jabbar Muhammad Uthman al-Qadasi, Adil Said al-Hajj Ubayd al-Busays, Sulayman Awad Bin Uqayl al-Nahdi, and Fahmi Salem Said al-Asani from the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay to the Government of the United Arab Emirates.
http://www.defense.gov/News/News-Releases/News-Release-View/Article/628980/detainee-transfers-announced?source=GovDelivery
The Scrotum Shaver said just hours before the Paris attacks that ISIS has been contained. And then, when the attacks occurred, the talking heads were falling all over themselves saying the attacks looked like the work of Al Qaeda, not ISIS. Then, after the attacks, ISIS said, ‘Yeah, those were our boys. Al’s Snack Bar!’ So, today, the Scrotum Shaver was asked about his declaration regarding the containment of ISIS (he prefers ISIL and I don’t much give a shit what he calls them—Pock-E-stan) and he says that he was talking about their having less territory today than they used to have. Ah. So the Paris terrorists did their deeds from a smaller area? Um. No. It’s just that THE ONE is NEVER EVER wrong.
As for the 20 whatevers, I guess that’s Vlad’s limit: “Okay. I see you need a show to keep your sorry asses in power so I’ll go along–but the limit is 20. Got it? 20. If you drop or fire 21, it’s your ass.”
He will never say ISIS, or that the ISers were at fault, because if he did, he would have to admit that he was wrong all along… and his ego can’t take that.
Fuel comes from a “Refinery”. “Refineries” are bad… they kill Polar Bears. Al Gore taught me that. So why the fuck aren’t we blowing up the refineries? My guess is the refinery is owned by a “good muslim” and we don’t want to piss him off, because if we did, we would be playing into their hand.
My question is, if the guy that owns the refinery is such a good fucking muslim, why isn’t he attaching magnetic mines to the fuel trucks as they leave the dock? Alahu Akhbar, Have a very nice day, “click”, See ya [waves].
We’re probably paying $100K in military assets and overhead to destroy a $1500 truck in an endeavor to fix something those asshole “good muslims” should fix themselves for pennies.
I did targeting in Iraq amd many years ago in Korea as an Intel guy.
In general, the paradigm is reversed from the old days. Targets were things like tank brigades and fixed facilities. They were easy to find, hard to destroy. Now, targets are individuals or small groups hidden in the population. They are easy to destroy but hard to find.
We have been targeting rwfineries, and it looks to me like we have knocked out those that we can find. ME countries actually import more refined oil and fuel than you would think because they have a relativey small market (and bad guys keep blowing up the refineries). There are a Lott if ‘underground’ refineries, but they are hard to find.
These trucks were probably not transporting oil for ISIS vehicles, but rather for sale on the Black Marrket.
In terms of personality targeting, it is hard to find a specidfic bad guy with enough actionable lead time to make traditional air power useful. Thus the hellfire and DA SOF raids.
My guess is the targeteers sre hard pressed to find ‘good’ targets that meet aall of the Target Selection Standards. It will remain that way until we get some cool guys on the ground to start running sources.
Remember, if there are French born Algerians out there willing to shoot up a theater, there are probably a few willing to ‘join ‘ ISIS and send us some targetable info…
Given the location, I bet the fuel was imported too. From Iraq.
The governors of Michigan and Alabama will not accept any Syrian refugees now that at least one refugee has been identified as a Paris terrorist. That’s nice—except that while most intelligent folks were saying that the refugee bullshit was bullshit—that terrorists will doubtless be among them, the Left was calling us heartless and cold and haters and racists and whatnot. Well, the gov of Michigan is a tad late shutting the door. Over the past year, some estimated 2000 MEs have settled in Michigan and an estimated 200 of them came from Syria. I’m guessing that most of them are just Lions fans. Alabama has none but, then, Alabama doesn’t have an NFL team.
It’s now Texas, Arkansas, Mississippi, Indiana and Louisiana, along with Alabama and Michigan.
That said, we could export the population of Dearbonistan to Syria, it wouldn’t hurt my feelings at all. They can take the muslim population of Hamtramckstan with them when they go.
Is it me, or does BODAPREZ (the ghettofabulous one) acting a lot like LBJ in his “management” of the war on terror?
Not old enough to remember LBJ… sorry
No, the Scrotum Shaver is in a league of his own. Other than sharing the same middle initial, I see no similarities with LBJ, who increased VN troop levels by hundreds of thousands and ordered that the crap be bombed out of North VN. Of course, LBJ was checking the polls constantly when decision time arrived, something the Scrotum Shaver doesn’t much care about. He will do what he wants. He has a phone and a pen.
Same middle initial?
Oops.
Were I POTUS, the first thing I would have done (probably before the attack on Paris but most definitely following) would be position a SSGN off Syria’s coast. As soon as we locate any target of interest, be it supplies, personnel, ISIS leaders, etc, you order a TLAM strike on that target, be it a single Tomahawk missile or 150 missiles, and the SSGN remains there until it is empty or strike weapons or is relieved by another fully loaded SSGN. This pattern continues until ISIS is literally begging for the strikes to end, and then you launch on those doing the begging. ISIS needs to be wiped out completely, by any and all methods possible.
Gotta have targets, bro.
Go back up the thread a tad, and read Reddevil’s comment on the difficulty of finding targets. It ain’t easy.
Might be easier if we had some boots on the ground to call in strikes, but that’s not part of the current ROE imposed by the SCoaMF.
Since the Paris attacks, the French Police and others have busted in on almost 200 known/suspected terrorist apartments, houses, etc. You don’t develop actionable intel that quick, so this tells me that they knew of these folks but did nothing until now. Same with the airstrikes. This waiting game ain’t going to work.
Per France24’s reports, the weapons came from one district in Belgium, and the entire thing was set up by an immigrant Belgian citizen who is now in Syria. And they’re looking for him, too.
Unfortunately, going about this the way they are doing it now is like trying to find all the cockroaches in a building without bringing in the exterminator first. And the exterminators definitely need to be called in and put to work.
Well, there’s at least one bright spot in the situation: Obama hasn’t apologized to anyone yet.
That we know of.
Gee, twenty bombs. Isn’t that a few short of a B1-B load? You don’t need a thousand pounder to knock out a Toyota Tacoma. One of the new 110 lb bombs should do the trick. Hell, a bucket of concrete dropped from 10,000 ft should do it. When did War become kabuki theater?
When the people decided to put a community organizer in charge? Just a guess on my part.
Roger it takes 6 1,000 lbs bombs to take out a donkey under this administration. Lol
Barry’s press conference at G-20 did not go well for him and our outlook here in our great Nation is ominous at best based on his responses.
Some governors are suspended taking in refugees from Syria. I sent an article about it to Jonn.
Look at my 12:05 comment. Are there others?
See mine at 1:52, upthread.
The other TAH Article talks about it. I put an update there that 15 states are saying “F.O.” To Barry’s plan:
The resistance at the state level is coalescing at a rapid clip. So far, governors in at least 15 states have moved to suspend or restrict the refugee resettlement, including Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, Texas and Wisconsin.
The great communicator…nah just kidding — WJC & G ‘Dub were way better at persuading & inspiring.
Headlines you’ll never read:
After Third Day of Firebombing, Temperatures inside of Raqqa Top 1500F
ISIS HQ Bombed; Thousands Perish
President Announces First 1,000 Plane Bombing Raid Since WWII
Astronauts Aboard Space Station Can See Glow From Raqqa Firebombing
Coalition Against ISIS Puts 5,000 Tanks On Line; Demands Surrender by Dawn
Apologize for the double comment, but I posted in the wrong spot earlier…
I did targeting in Iraq amd many years ago in Korea as an Intel guy.
In general, the paradigm is reversed from the old days. Targets were things like tank brigades and fixed facilities. They were easy to find, hard to destroy. Now, targets are individuals or small groups hidden in the population. They are easy to destroy but hard to find.
We have been targeting refineries, and it looks to me like we have knocked out those that we can find. But, ME countries have fewer refineries and actually import more refined oil and fuel than you would think because they have a relativey small market (and bad guys keep blowing up the refineries). There are a lot of ‘underground’ refineries, but they are hard to find.
These trucks were probably not transporting oil for ISIS vehicles, but rather for sale on the Black Market.
In terms of personality targeting, it is hard to find a specific bad guy with enough actionable lead time to make traditional air power useful. Thus the hellfire and DA SOF raids.
My guess is the targeteers are hard pressed to find ‘good’ targets that meet all of the Target Selection Standards. It will remain that way until we get some cool guys on the ground to start running sources.
Remember, if there are French born Algerians and Moroccans out there willing to shoot up a theater, there are probably a few willing to ‘join ‘ ISIS and send us some targetable info…
Okay, I’ll give you two targets that are easy to find.
1 – Raqqa, Syria. Bomb the crap out of it, from the center to the outskirts five miles from center. Then go back and bomb it again.
2 – The dam at Mosul. Then bomb Mosul. Then bomb the roads between Mosul and all other cities.
Those aren’t hard to find or blow up.
If I remember correctly a B-52 can carry 109 500lb bombs. Trail formation and ARC Light. Flatten one city; I don’t care which. Then tell the ME if there is another ISIS/Al Qaeda attack the next strike will flatten two. Keep flattening cities until their public opinion and support is gone because they are tired of having their shit destroyed. Yes we will al be war criminals and the U.N. will levy some type of sanction against us, but this shit will eventually stop.
If I recall, no one got in trouble for bombing Dresden during WWII.
As Albrech pointed out in a previous thread, the rules have changed post WWII. What was legal then is not legal now.
Legal? Last I heard murdering unarmed civilians is illegal. Screw them; they want war give them war. Bomb the living hell out of them and kill as many of them as possible until they stop supporting stupid shit. No one from Hiroshima has screwed with us for 70 years.
Just give it time and the Mosul Dam will take care of itself…I think deep down, the Kurds are just looking for plausible deniability when it breaches – and who can blame them? The flood will split ISIS’s forces in half, destroying every Tigris river bridge south of Kurdistan, while draining a lake that bifurcates Kurdish territory. Check this out from Rudaw:
http://rudaw.net/english/opinion/19102015
“Kurdistan’s longstanding problems have been massively exacerbated by external factors that would challenge the most robust countries: completely axed and then only partial federal budget payments in 2014 and 2015 respectively, increased defence costs through saving and protecting Kirkuk from Daesh and protecting the strategic Mosul dam whose waters could flood Baghdad but not Kurdistan, looking after nearly two million refugees and internally displaced people (the UK equivalent of over 20 million people), costly PKK attacks on the oil pipeline to Turkey which cost half a billion dollars, and massive reductions in world oil prices. Each is catastrophic but combine to make a perfect storm.”
It’s like they’re pointing a gun at Baghdad, who of course can’t get their heads out of their asses enough to see it…
Is it really in that bad shape?
What about taking out the Samarra dam and the Ramadi dam? I know they’re further south, but might that work, too?
There has to be some strategic resource in the part of Syria that ISIS occupies now. Destroy that, too, and then whack them they run from it.
I’m surprised it’s still standing. The US Army Corps of Engineers put out a report in 2007 about it: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/29/AR2007102902193.html?hpid=topnews Saddam insisted it be built where it was – which was smack on top of gypsum, which dissolves in the presence of water. From the minute the lake started to form, they’ve had to run 24/7 grouting operations. Earlier estimates said that if the grouting stopped for even a week, the dam would be fatally undermined. Well, when ISIS took the dam, grouting stopped for longer than that and it stood – but just because you outlived the doctor’s “three months to live” doesn’t mean you’re cured. When the Kurds took the dam back, grouting started back up, but has it been as effective as it needs to be? It’s a war zone – are they getting the quality of materials they need? How many workmen quit the gig after ISIS took the site in August 2014? How much irreversible damage was done in the two weeks when ISIS was in control and grouting ground to a halt? This dam is no joke – estimates are that half a million people would die if it failed catastrophically. The water would be 65 feet deep in Mosul, and still 8 feet deep when it hit Baghdad. Every bridge from the dam down to south of Baghdad would likely be gone. ISIS would be impacted, no doubt, but even more would the central government of Iraq. Everyone loses – except the Kurds, who see both enemies weakened, but their freedom of movement increased between Dohuk and Syria. I sometimes think the surest path to an independent Kurdistan would be the failure of that dam… I’m sure the Samarra dam would do some damage if it failed, but nothing like Mosul Dam – it doesn’t hold near the water, and most of its reservoir is sediment anyway. I don’t know enough about Anbar’s geography to speak to Ramadi or Haditha dams, though I expect they’d do significant damage downstream as well – I’d guess they’d have less impact on ISIS than on Baghdad,… Read more »
Breach of the Haditha Dam might be nearly as bad. Per Wikipedia the reservoir formed by the Haditha Damn holds 1.7 to 2.0 cu mi of water. For comparison, the Mosul Dam’s reservoir holds 2.7 cu mi.
‘looking after nearly two million refugees and internally displaced people (the UK equivalent of over 20 million people)’ WTF, over?
So 1 Muslim = 10 Brits? Have they not been notified about white privilege?
Target 3 –
Batman, Turkey.
Just because. HOLY BATMAN!
116 fuel trucks sounds like a two ship A-10 gun run to me.
And one of the A-10s could fly inverted to live stream the attack on youtube from his smart phone.
ISIS (or ISIL as Barry’s mouthpiece calls them)
should be about out of “capable” fighters considering all of those training facilities we’ve destroyed.
And those that are left don’t have effective guidance due to all of the ISIS/ISIL command facilities bombed.
I am so NOT looking forward to go back to that $hithole for my 3rd war.
There is no stomach for executing this war within DC.
The current admin’s policy is to play Dean Smith 4 corners and hope that January 2017 shows up before the next big attack on the U.S. occurs. For a lot of people it will not matter what the 8 years before begat, it will only matter who is in charge when it happens.
Funny, in the military you start leaving things for your replacement maybe 3 months out. He’s at 15 months left and he’s been doing this “leave it for the next guy” stuff for 6 months already. (That we know of)
He’s at the point where he just wantes to finish his priorities of Climate Change, reducing the military to NMC numbers, get 100K refugees into the US, and close GITMO (even if that means releasing the rest of the detainees and give them a ticket anywhere they want to go).
This will probably piss off the Airpower enthusiasts here, but the fact is that a bombing campaign will never be effective against a group like ISIS. Partly due to the way Airpower is targeted, and partly due to,how a hybrid force like ISIS operates. There are two basic concepts for picking a target: you study the enemy to develop High Value Targets (HVT); those things that are critical to the enemy. From those you select High Payoff Targets (HPT), those targets that best support our plan. In other words, of the things that would hurt the enemy the most, you target those that best support your plan. To select good HVTs you have to be able to see and understand the enemy. To select good HPTs you have to have a plan. We don’t have good Intel, and we don’t have a good plan (or any plan at all), so our targeting is going to be random and ineffective. Leveling cities and destroying dams won’t really hurt ISIS (they’ll just leave), and it won’t facilitate our strategy (we don’t have one). It will kill some ISIS fighters, but it will also kill a much larger number of civilians. Like it or not, this won’t pass any of the proportionality or necessity tests to make them legal targets. ISIS says they are at war with the West and the U.S. In particular. I think we should take them at their word. You can’t fight a war effectively from the air alone. To do this we will have to send in ground troops- real live boots on the ground, not SOF advisors. This should be a massive operation- we would have to set the conditions and shape the battlefield, meaning that we would have to have sufficient force on the ground to block escape routes and go in to destroy what doesn’t flee. It also means handling refugees in a humane manner so they don’t simply flee to Europe. It would be ugly, expensive, and costly in terms of human lives, and it will take a long time. Do we have the… Read more »
If you could find some venue to convince every ISer that going to Raqqa or some central place like that was vital – BIG IMPORTANT CELEBRATION – and that they had to be there by a specific date, it would be possible to use airpower on them.
If Anonymous, for example, could be persuaded to put out a message like that – calling them all ‘home’ – nukes would work, too. Maybe there is some way to play to their superstitions and make it happen that way.
Nuke ’em.
Seriously. I’d like to see France work itself into a huge hissy fit and drop a low yield tactical nuclear weapon in the middle of the largest group of ISIS they can find. Then while sphincters pucker up all over the world, France can sit back and say, “Tu disais?”.
You don’t kill roaches by stepping on only those you see. You need an exterminator.
You kill roaches by poisoning the nest. There are several ways to do that. One is provide the poison in a food source that they take back to the nest with them. Another is to find the nest itself and make it uninhabitable.
It’s strange that the most successful roach killer is Black Flag, isn’t it?
Not an advocate of the nuke option. We would kill a lot of ISIS but we would also be giving ISIS a whole lot of radioactive material to use in a dirty bomb.
However, we should be actively recruiting people to join ISIS and work for us. A good source, even at the pipe swinger level, could give us all sorts of useful information just be being lazy on social media.
Nah. No nukes. Just fire. High yield explosives, and lots of fire. Basically, Ex-PH2’s plan– except with a lot more fire. Have ourselves a pig roast over their burning, broken bodies.
Fire would work well.