US special forces captured ISIS chemical weapons chief in Iraq, official reveals

Well, we seem to have mad progress and as usual, the military has hit a home run and decided to advise us at a later time. The article goes on to say that the Obama admin started a more aggressive policy in Dec, of last year... I think that where there is one, there are more - what say you ATS?

U.S. special forces captured the head of the Islamic State terror group's unit trying to develop chemical weapons in a raid last month in northern Iraq, a defense official tells Fox News.

"We are using information we have learned for operations,” one official said. The captured operative was identified as Sleiman Daoud al-Afari.

He told U.S. interrogators ISIS had converted banned mustard gas into powdered form to launch in artillery shells, The New York Times adds.

U.S. officials said last week the Delta Force team had captured an Islamic State leader but had refused to identify him, saying only that he had been held for two or three weeks and was being questioned.

Iraqi officials said al-Afari worked for Saddam Hussein's now-dissolved Military Industrialization Authority where he specialized in chemical and biological weapons. They said al-Afari, who is about 50 years old, heads the Islamic State group's recently established branch for the research and development of chemical weapons.

He was captured in a raid near the northern Iraqi town of Tal Afar, the officials told The Associated Press. They would not give further details.

L I N K

originally posted by: ReadLeader
Well, we seem to have mad progress and as usual, the military has hit a home run and decided to advise us at a later time.

a. they didnt hit a home run, how can people still believe what the US says they are doing to ISIS, when not too long ago Russia bombed the heck out isis and did in a week what the US was waisting money and personnel. amongst other things.

b. what you are reading is simply an advertisement. they just regurgitated obscure facts in a way for you, the unsuspecting public to see it as a plus.

a reply to: ReadLeader



Somehow related :

ISIS shelled Kurdish-controlled Iraq village with 'poisonous substances' – governor



Exclusive: 1736 documents reveal ISIS jihadists personal data

a reply to: theultimatebelgianjoke

Great link Ultimate!

More than 40 people suffered from partial chocking and skin irritation after mortar shells and Katyusha rockets filled with the "poisonous substances" exploded in the mainly Shia Turkmen village, which is located south of the oil city of Kirkuk, in a region under Kurdish control.

a reply to: ReadLeader

That's great, I hope they water board him for good measure, or as a pass time.

a reply to: ReadLeader

Good to hear that the US is concentrating efforts in Iraq.

That side of the ISIS occupation has been largely ignored. If the US and Iraq can chase ISIS toward the Syrian border, the Russians, Iranians, Hezbollah, the Syrian army and whoever else is fighting for Assad on that side will mop them up for sure.

ISIS is on it's last legs, and we should all be thankful for that in spite of the fact it took far too long for everyone to come together and work out a plan of action in Syria.

originally posted by: odzeandennz

originally posted by: ReadLeader
Well, we seem to have mad progress and as usual, the military has hit a home run and decided to advise us at a later time.

a. they didnt hit a home run, how can people still believe what the US says they are doing to ISIS, when not too long ago Russia bombed the heck out isis and did in a week what the US was waisting money and personnel. amongst other things.

b. what you are reading is simply an advertisement. they just regurgitated obscure facts in a way for you, the unsuspecting public to see it as a plus.

Anybody with even a very basic understanding of military operations knows it takes months to years for a bombing campaign to begin to have any real effect on an enemy. Russia did bomb ISIS for one week after its plane was bombed but, to so they had ask coordinate with the US so the US could stop and Russia could step in for some PR to say they hit back. The rest of the time they have been bombing other rebels and civilians. The price you pay for not having precision guided weapons. How many times in the first month did Russia declare victory claiming ISIS was defeated or running away only to have them continue what they were doing? Of course your not suppose to remember that.

What is very clear over the last year is the US has been getting good intel on ISIS leadership targets and has been taking them out. Again this is something that takes years to set up, just as the US did with AlQuida. Once you have those intel assets in place to can start to so real damage.

As for they guy they captured in the OP he was a former member of Saddams forces and likely was working with ISIS only under threat and now he is free is singing like a bird. As the US bombing campaign has wrecked ISIS logistics, oil production and even cash depots the internal workings of ISIS that allowed it to function has fallen apart. Strategic bombing campaigns are designed for this very purpose. They however take a long time to get results and in today's instant satisfaction society they do not play well PR wise. However ISIS now on its last leg with US backed forces advancing on its last strong holds. ISIS as a military force will done by the end of the year.

I genuinely try to take this # seriously and then after about two paragraphs I get an image of children hiding Easter eggs for them to go back out and find.

No. Right?

With all the Intel that the US is getting from around the world, they should be able to find anything they want to know and get who ever they want and not need years to organize anything.
Whatever the reason for them to be taking so long and at the same time dropping supplies in places where they know that the bad guys will get them first, remains to be seen.

a reply to: JHumm

Air drops aren't as easy as people think. This is an article that talks a little about it.

Two weeks ago, the United Nations World Food Programme’s attempt to air-drop 21 pallets of food to some 200,000 starving Syrians in the ISIS-beseiged city of Deir ez-Zor ended in failure. The threat of anti-aircraft fire forced the Russian transport aircraft chartered by the U.N. to release its cargo—enough lentils, rice, vegetable oil, and salt to feed 2,500 people for a month, the food agency said—from an altitude of 23,000 feet. The Guardian reported that four pallets were destroyed because their parachutes didn’t open, seven landed too far away from the target area to be of benefit, and 10 had drifted so far off course they could not be located.

www.airspacemag.com...

Unless they use something to get an accurate reading on the winds, a high altitude air drop is going anywhere, and the technology used to measure the winds is expensive, and needs to be recovered after the drop, so unless they have someone on the ground to do that, it's not used.

There does seem to be a significant diminishment in ISIS over the past few months. That's a good thing. How they metastasized over the past few years is a question to be answered once their corpses have stopped smoldering.

I'm absolutely sure that if anyone looks to deep into it they will find Turkey, SA, and the Gulf States to be neck deep in where they got funding and support. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to find US and other Western interests had clandestinely given aid to people that would eventually morph into ISIS.

I only wish that there was someone not entrenched in the foreign policy establishment on both sides of the US who would air this out in the open and let the consequences fall where they may.

a reply to: ReadLeader

US special forces captured ISIS chemical weapons chief in Iraq, official reveals.

Now you watch. He'll squeal like a stuck pig and he will prove every accusation made against Assad by the US, true on every count.

a reply to: TechniXcality

That's great, I hope they water board him for good measure, or as a pass time.

Or jam this POS head down the toilet for a game of "Find The Koran"..........

The right question one should ask now is, where does the chemicals come from ?

Does anyone remember when Collin Powells carpet-bombed the UN assembly with BS in order to justify the Iraq intervention ? I suppose no-one would try himself at a similar exercise atm or is it ...
For what it's worth :

Turkish MP Faces Treason Charges After Telling RT ISIS Used Turkey For Transiting Sarin