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New US Airstrikes In Iraq Intended to Protect Important Dam
U.S. military involvement in Iraq is heating up again; the sudden rise of the organization known as the Islamic State has put a kink in the gradual, ongoing winding down of U.S. military presence in that country, and today that kink has gotten a little sharper. From The New York Times: The United States launched a fresh series of airstrikes against Sunni fighters in Iraq late Saturday in what Defense Department officials described as a mission to stop militants from seizing an important dam on the Euphrates River and prevent the possibility of floodwaters being unleashed toward the capital, Baghdad. The attacks were aimed at militant fighters of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria as they were moving toward the Haditha Dam, officials said. The operation represented another expansion of the limited goals that President Obama set out when he announced last month that he had authorized airstrikes in Iraq.
is this news for nerds?
Director's "We were always at war with the Middle East" cut now available on all good election platforms!
This struggle will be going on for decades (if we're lucky, longer if not), until the extremists get tired of it and want to live in peace. Until then any talk of "ending the war" is as silly as claiming you can tear down a dam because the river stopped flowing. It stopped flowing because of the dam. Tearing down the dam while the water is still there will have the obvious consequence.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
all the money and weapon ISIS has all came from American govt.
its US tactic to create instability in Middle-East to gain control over oil there.
They are terrorists, sort of like republicans, only with fewer guns.
If Saddam was still in power, he would be major american ally in "fighting terrorists". Orwell would laugh his ass out if he lived to this day.
839*929
Recently, it has been a constant stream of propaganda hitting this site.
Fuck off.
I think this is a simple case of "you break it, you buy it".
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
If I wanted to read about this shit, I would not come here.
Sending IS back to hell with airpower is easy when they are out in the open. But once Islamic State fighters retreat to towns like Fallujah it will be very difficult to twist them out of their holes. It will require house to house fighting and the towns will be more or less destroyed in the process with great cost to any civilians in the area. If the Shiite dominated Iraq Army does it there will be all kinds of payback. But I doubt they will step up. It will be up to mostly the US with help from the UK and some token help from a few other countries. Colin Powell was right. We broke it, we bought it.
...change the motto of Slashdot? It is so annoying to read "news for nerds" all the time while I am browsing through my beloved war/politics related articles.. /sarcasm
We were always at war with the Middle East.
That's where the argument takes you.
All the Rand Paul lovers and Snowden supporters should join ISIS and help them to free their information for all the world to see.
Oh, I see, it's just "a kink in the gradual, ongoing winding down of U.S. military presence". This is the sort of tendentious characterization I'd expect from a white house spokesperson striving mightily to minimize the significance of recent events. According to Wikipedia, the withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Iraq was completed in 2011. I can find plenty of voices calling the withdrawal "precipitous", so I'd like to see a citation for it being gradual and ongoing, if you please.
Drown a few hundred thousand. What's the worst that happens? The liberals blame the Jews?
You ought to know personal ideology almost always trumps cold hard facts ; ).
"Kill 'em all and let Root sort 'em out"
Look at the military hardware the Saddam era Iraqi army used: It wasn't American make, it was Russian/Soviet. Now look at Egypt, a country the US does arm, they are using US equipment.
Unsurprisingly, when countries arm other countries, they do it using their stuff. It is not only convenient, but it is one of those nice political things where you can help your own industries because you are buying from them.
"Hopefully"? It is happening, Snowden did ISIS a big favor.
If that's the case, the Brit's really need to own up and clean out their mess.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Every revolution results in the most brutal, morally crude, religiously exploitive group coming to power. This is a simple function of a free for all fragfest. If we are so revolted by some head chopping, what about French revolution and its guillotine? If US and other countries didn't launch military intervention after similarly brutal bolshevik revolution in Russia, we could have avoided much of cold war, including current Ukrainian episode. Any country would want to establish a friendly buffer zone after being repeatedly attacked from the same direction many times.
We have nothing to offer to people of Iraq. The government we installed last time supported Shias killing Sunnis. Now it's the other way around. To change that, minds of millions of people need to be changed. It's not a matter of installing one government or bombing one rebel faction. When there is a visionary with big following, we could try to support him, like German's who helped install Lenin into power in exchange for a big piece of territory. All the good it ultimately done them.
Not just the UK. Germany, Italy, France, China etc are all guilty of creating this mess.
These wars were bullshit from the beginning. Governments are good at one thing and that is genocide and this is not an opinion but a fact dictated by history. U.S created and labeled these so called freedom fighters Mujahidin, Al-Qaeda, and now ISIS all trained in the U.S. U.S has a long history of funding radicals and dictators all over the world including South America, toppling democratic elected governments. I wouldn't be surprised if the U.S government trained and funded the Nazi's or even the Bolsheviks. Humans are one of the most disgusting animals on this planet.
Implies it wasn't a mess before we got there.
GW Bush restored the Sunni/Sheia war, putting it back the way western europe found it. No need to thank him. Oil should be sucked mostly dry soon, so restoring the irrelevance too.
Now we're just enforcing a stalemate. Bet we wouldn't be doing a thing to ISIS if they weren't winning. See also Iran/Iraq war.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
"the sudden rise of the organization known as the Islamic State has put a kink in the gradual, ongoing winding down of U.S. military presence"
Put a kink in it? IT WAS CAUSED BY IT!!
All He Does Is Divine. Let us give praise and say Amen.
President Obama is replacing Kathryn Ruemmler as White House Counsel, saying he needs a wartime consigliere. Ms Ruemmler will be replaced by Jeh Johnson, former head of homeland security. The White House also announced the untimely death of Ms Ruemmler, believed to have been killed in a domestic drone strike that went awry. The President vowed to have the Justice Department, under Attorney General Holder, investigate the errant strike, get to the bottom of it, and bring those responsible to justice. The investigation is expected to conclude sometime in 2022.
The idea that IS would flood Baghdad makes no sense to me: if they want to rule the territory, such a bold move against the non fighting population is counter productive: it seems impossible to be considered as a legitimate power after that.