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Subject: ISIL Seeks A New Gimmick
SYSOP    3/23/2015 5:59:08 AM
 
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joe6pack       3/23/2015 7:32:31 PM
Stalled with heavy casaulties... and really haven't started to fight for the city center. What a surprise. I liked the bit about the militias trust in God, charge ahead.. Air support is for girly men. Some real deep tactical thinkers there.. it's amazing they haven't won yet.
 
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Nate Dog    you forget the most important part   3/23/2015 7:52:32 PM
This is all still our fault.
 
 
We tolerate this.
Worse, this asshole is a public servant, being paid upwards of $100,000 per year and likely more, the headmaster of the largest Islamic school in Melbourne. I cannot fathom the depths of our stupidity to tolerate this within our midst. Im likely the most liberal poster on this crazy conservative forum. But shit like this is the reason Arabs tear chunks out of one another so brutally day in day out. 
Its never our fault. We aren't responsible so we wont fix the problem, you did this to us, you fix it for us. Then we'll burn effigies of you in the street for being the arbiters of our doom.
 
 
And yeah. No surprises. We all said it. Bloody warfare, followed by heavy artillery barrage to flatten the city. By the time they're done, nothing will be left to fight over. Another Aleppo. Mosul will turn out the same way.
I need to find the article that was talking about the economic losses incurred thus far by Syria. I'm sketchy on the figure, but a country who's GDP at peak wasn't much above $200 billion has suffered some several trillions of dollars worth of infrastructure losses. Some 3 million houses destroyed, several cities worth of infrastructure, from public works, sewerage, power stations, transport. Trillions. They'll never ever recover. Iraq can't be far behind. And again, no one taking responsibility for their own actions. The mongols destroyed Baghdad in 1250ish, the Arabs never recovered the Caliphate from that. This looks to equally as monumental a loss as that if not bigger. 

What a ridiculous country populated by a ridiculous people. What's the point of making war, if all you win in the end is ruins.
 
 
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joe6pack       3/23/2015 8:38:17 PM
""They are trained and equipped by them: [the] evidence is all the shiny new equipment," he said. "We don't believe Muslims are creating IS."
 
Yeah.. the shiny new weapons.. (stamped property of Iraqi Army).. never fired, only dropped once... And why are we dropping bombs on them.. instead of sitting back and eating popcorn?
  
 I still like the theory, it's all about taking all the oil..  So, the U.S. was in Iraq for a decade.. oil, still there.. Apparently.. we are the worst thieves... ever.. 
 
The first gulf war.. had nearly a million troops.. in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq...  pretty sure we could have killed pretty much everyone.. and taken all the oil.. nope.. still there.. 
 
Anyhow... I also liked this bit in the article:
"...leads to bad morale and all sorts of other problems. Iran learned this during the 1980s war with Iraq although the official line was that these heavy losses among fanatical but poorly trained troops was heroic and necessary. More insightful Iranian military leaders blame the inability of Iran to decisively defeat Iraq back then to demoralization suffered by Iranian forces because of the suicidal attacks by fanatic troops inspired mainly by radical clerics rather than well thought out tactics and some training."
 
I've been wondering about all these assessments of the Iranians suddenly gaining some competency at land warfare.. they couldn't deal with the Iraqi's.. who were bad at it..  Where did this competency supposedly come from in the last 15-20 years?   At best, they seem to be able to stir the "militias" to action.. and put some backbone in the Iraqi Army.. 
 
 
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karlmaier    Jihadist vs. Jihadists   3/23/2015 10:57:14 PM
I agree, getting between the Sunni Jihadists using all their resources to kill the Shiite Jihadists and vice-a-versa, is just stupid. After all, we want all the Jihadists dead, and having them kill each other is the ideal situation, we should be encouraging this with talk or selling arms to which ever side is ascendant. If the Jihadists are focusing all their resources on killing each other, a huge side benefit will be no resources left for terrorist attacks on innocents in the west. 
 
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Nate Dog    And what of the rest of the Arabs?   3/24/2015 12:37:46 AM
Jihadi Vs Jihadi may be the 21st century version of the best Mad comic strip ever written, but unfortunately, they dont tend to target each other. Too hard to find, and too dangerous to kill.
No, easier to be a Sunni jihadi, and kill Shitte civilians, the ones that are easy to find, in mosques, schools, and bus stops. Goes the other way too. So, while it's true that most casualties of Muslim terrorists are other Muslims, most of those victims are civilians. Hardly deserving of a rat poisoned covered ball bearing tearing through their ass as they go shopping.
 
If theres anything at all to be done, it'll be through re-education. Cultural re-education. Let them keep their book. Its not the cause. I promise you that if i were to use the Old Testament exclusively, i could find the exact same excuses why God told me to kill all of you. 
Responsibility for ones actions should be an introduced theme. Rammed home at the point of a bayonet perhaps, but one way or another. Simply leaving them to their whiles clearly hasn't resulted in the desired affect.
 
 
 
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Nate Dog    Getting worse   3/24/2015 7:08:42 AM
 
Turns out that the drive on Tikrit is just a Shitte attack on Sunnis. 1000's of homes burnt in villages approaching Tikrit, goodness knows whats happening inside. Sunni being pushed towards supporting ISIL even more.
 
Then theres the other side of the coin. Howevers running the show at ISIL has read Sun-Tsu, attack where the enemys not. Now that the Shitte militias are angling north, ISIL has renewed attacks in the west. Conquering an Iraqi army Divisional command centre. This doesn't sound like victory to me.
Lots and lots of dead. New Syria. Yemen hot on their heals...
Things still haven't hit rock bottom. Disaster.
 
 
 
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Nate Dog    Complicit   3/24/2015 6:14:32 PM
 
Thats it, US forces are now taking part in pure sectarian slaughter. What has turned out to be purely Shitte attack on Sunni with little semblance of any kind of 'liberation' now involves US support. While we'll never manage to indict any of the assholes that lead either Shitte or Sunni forces in the region for war crimes (the whole mess is one giant war crime) 
Surely:
 
"The coalition began providing ISR (intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance) support on March 21, 2015 at the request of the government of Iraq, and the US is now providing that support," the senior official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
 
This means that US forces participating are now complicit in what ever actions happen going forward?
If another town is burned to the ground by Shitte forces while US forces are participating, from a legal standpoint, where does that leave them?!?!
 
 
 
 
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WarNerd    Complicit    3/24/2015 11:30:44 PM
While the US is supply intelligence information it is not in the chain of command.  There are no US troops engaged and they have little, if any, input on command decisions.  The US has also been promised by the Iraqi government that no sectarian slaughter is planned, so they have another legal out.  But the government does not control the militia units.
 
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joe6pack       3/25/2015 12:12:15 PM
On the legal weaseling front...  I was pretty sure there were more than a few bits of law and regulation regarding cooperation with state sponsors of terrorism..  With Iran being a major sponsor of terrorism.. and the Iraqi government having given de facto control of much of their armed forces to Iran... Not sure how we aren't breaking laws somewhere.. in providing any sort of assistance.....
 
 
 
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trenchsol       3/25/2015 12:12:58 PM

 
I am trying to understand Iraq battlefield, but I am not sure if I am getting it right.
 
If one is trying to advance on Baghdad from Syria, it can be done either from the  north or from the west. There is a desert with no roads between those two.
 
Key city in the north is Mosul, all roads go through it. Key cities to the west are Hit, Ramadi and Falluja.
 
Shiite government could have attacked Mosul directly if they wanted to work with Kurds. That would have cut Tikrit off and put IS in the city in hopeless position. If government took Tikrit, it would relive Baiji to the north, which is still in government hands. Baiji is where the major Iraqi refinery is.
 
In the west, IS holds Hit and Falluja. Ramadi is between the two, and government holds it, but just barely.
 
If government and Iran fail in Tikrit, Baiji will, most likely fall to IS. If Ramadi falls IS will have open road to Baghdad.
 
It looks like government consider Kurds no more than lesser enemy at the moment.
 
If am wrong about above, please correct me.
 
 
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