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ISIS Is Dropping Bombs With Drones In Iraq (popsci.com)
In addition to rifles, mortars, artillery and suicidal car bombs, ISIS has recently added commercial drones, converted into tiny bombs, into the mix of weapons it uses to fight in Iraq. In October, The New York Times reported that the Islamic State was using small consumer drones rigged with explosives to fight Kurdish forces in Iraq. Two Kurdish soldiers died dismantling a booby-trapped ISIS drone. Several months later and it appears the use of drones on the battlefield is becoming more prevalent. Popular Science reports: Previously, we've seen ISIS scratch-build drones, and as Iraqi Security Forces retook parts of Mosul, they discovered a vast infrastructure of workshops (complete with quality control) for building standardized munitions, weapons, and explosives. These drone bombers recently captured by Iraqi forces and shared with American advisors appear to be commercial, off-the-shelf models, adapted to carry grenade-sized payloads. "It's not as if it is a large, armed UAV [unmanned aerial vehicle] that is dropping munitions from the wings -- but literally, a very small quadcopter that drops a small munition in a somewhat imprecise manner," [Col. Brett] Sylvia, commander of an American military advising mission in Iraq, told Military Times. "They are very short-range, targeting those front-line troops from the Iraqis." Because the drones used are commercial models, it likely means that anti-drone weapons already on hand with the American advisors are sufficient to stop them. It's worth noting that the bomb-dropping drones are just a small part of how ISIS uses the cheap, unmanned flying machines. Other applications include scouts and explosive decoys, as well as one-use weapons. ISIS is also likely not the first group to figure out how to drop grenades from small drones; it's a growing field of research and development among many violent, nonstate actors and insurgent groups. Despite the relative novelty, it's also likely not the deadliest thing insurgents can do with drones.
Only with a multiple million dollar registry of every single drone bought and sold in the US can we hope. Otherwise the terrorist will just build them out of raw components anyway and you'll make the entire thing look silly.
Our Nobel Peace Prize President dropped 26,000 bombs (real bombs, not little hand grenades) last year on various brown people (even though we are not at war).
This effort by ISIS is a pittance in comparison.
BTW, has anyone considered that it might be preferable to address their grievances rather than just bomb them?
I don't read your sig. Why are you reading mine?
Killing people with remote control aircraft, I wonder where they got that idea. They're getting almost as good at killing people as Americans.
Do you honestly think it will work?
After all, they are hardly going to obey a tweet saying "Could all ISIS members stand at these coordinates please - Signed Donald". I mean, you may get some but mostly you are just going to piss them off even more.
I have no idea why the US is so reluctant to deal with the actual issues but I am fairly sure dropping nukes isn't going to help.
Good point. This is precisely the point about the Sharansky Doctrine that everybody missed. President Bush and others around him naively believed that if they unleased democracy in the Middle East, everything would be hunky dory. The factor they missed out completely: Islam. Which is NOT a democratic or pluralistic religion, and which specifically is opposed to democracy in the Quran itself (18:26).
Becoming democratic worked in Latin America and helped those countries like Chile and Argentina become civil societies b'cos there were no other forces undercutting any such pluralistic culture. It's not the same in any Islamic group, as pointed out above. There is no separation b/w mosque and state: Mohammed was both a religious and political leader. The Caliphate was the succession of this dual-role leadership after his death: every Caliph, be it in Damascus, Raqqa, Baghdad, Cairo or Istanbul, was considered both a religious and political leader of all Muslims. It ended in 1924, and the current internecine war b/w Muslims is whether a new one is needed, and who'd lead it.
The other thing about Muslims is that they are not live and let live people. We've seen it in Iraq, where the long persecuted Shias started persecuting Christians, Sunnis and anyone else once the US handed over power to a democrat i.e. Shia government (since they are the majority in that country). Similarly, when Aleppo first fell to the 'rebels' - the Free Syrian Army, they made it a point to either murder or drive the local Christians out of the city. It's not that the persecuted groups anywhere - be it Sunnis in Syria, Kurds in Syria or Iraq, Shias in Iraq, Houthis in Yemen or anyone else - would simply like to be left alone: they want to replace the oppressors and switch roles altogether, so that their respective brand of Islam is recognized as the 'true Islam'. Incidentally, that's what it means in every country: in Iran, it would be the Islam as laid out by the Ayatollahs, in Iraq, it's Shia Islam, since Shias are 60%, in Saudi Arabia, it's the Wahabis, in Oman, it's the Ibadis, and so on. Which is why you have these wars of domination in most of these countries.
This is why you are right: not only is it none of our business, but also, it is something we cannot solve. As infidels, we have nothing to gain in which Islam ends up on top. In fact, given that all of Islam is about hatred of everything 'un-Islamic', the best thing to do is to get out of there and let them fight each other like the 2 cats of Kilkinney. Just bar the doors so that their refugees can't flee to non-Muslim lands spreading their mayhem there, like they've done in Germany and Austria. As long as that happens, just let them go at it. Any of their beauties wants to upload their carnage on Facebook or Twitter, let them, but as a policy, make it clear that it's their war, not ours. Any US journalist is stupid enough to go there, leave them there, and let them be converted to Islam or beheaded or both.
Another positive side-effect of this: the more they fight each other, the less they have in fighting against us, and causing terror out here. This civil war may be a blight on humanity, but it's a good thing for the non-Muslim world that instead of fighting the rest of us, they are busy on each other.
May all sides in this conflict win. And lose. Or whatever
So, what's your proposal to drag Islam from the Middle Ages all the way to the 21st century?
Easy, here it is:
1. stop bombing the living shit out of them
2. stop invading random countries to pump their oil
3. stop assassinating local leaders we don't like
4. don't install puppet governments in place of assassinated leaders we didn't like.
Path to stability needs to be.... stable. I mean if you are out to bomb them then also please occupy, name them your colony and be responsible for what happens over the next few decades, rather than retreating and letting local warlords slug it off for dominance circa 1269.
I have no idea why the US is so reluctant to deal with the actual issues
Because there is money being made. It's as simple as that.