Our men are brave and great, but this was set up to be used as propoganda by obummer to take the light off of Russia’s crushing success.
he will lament a man FAR BETTER than he will ever be, the lost soldier.
and 60 minutes got its order to put on a show this weekend showing our devastating pinpoitn accuracy against ISIS past year even though Air Force members say the usually return with full load.
How does the military (heck, every American) feel, after WH said it (meaning Obama) never signed on the mission, therefore implying not responsible for the ‘failure’?
FUBO, a worst CinC America doesn’t really deserve.
What??? Teamobama helped the Kurds? No way he knew about this.
God Bless this man for his sacrifice.
And God help the men that ask our young soldiers to do their bidding. We should not be “helping” these people. Either fight a war or don’t.
Could have used these guys at Benghazi
No boots on the ground in Iraq, and no Americans in combat, right Barry?
something more:
US Special Forces, Kurdish troops raid Islamic State prison in Iraq
BY BILL ROGGIO | October 23rd, 2015 | admin@longwarjournal.org | @billroggio
The Department of Defense announced today that US Special Forces and Kurdish forces launched an air assault against an Islamic State-run prison near Hawijah in central Iraq. One US soldier was killed during the raid, which the military insists was not a combat operation, but part of its “advise and assist” mission. From the Department of Defense press release:
U.S. Special Forces supported an Iraqi peshmerga operation earlier today to rescue about 70 hostages from an Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant prison near Hawijah, Iraq, Defense Department Press Secretary Peter Cook told reporters at the Pentagon this afternoon.
American Special Forces personnel carried out the planned operation at the request of the Kurdistan regional government after learning through intelligence sources that the hostages faced imminent mass execution, Cook said.
The Special Forces mission was consistent with Operation Inherent Resolve’s counter-ISIL efforts to train, advise, and assist Iraqi forces, he emphasized.
One U.S. service member and four peshmerga soldiers were wounded when ISIL extremists fired on U.S. and Iraqi forces during the rescue, he said, adding the U.S. service member was medically treated but later died.
The recovered hostages were placed with the Kurdistan Regional government, Cook said, adding that no hostages died during the rescue to his knowledge.
“The U.S. provided helicopter lift and accompanied Iraqi peshmerga forces to the compound,” where ISIL held the hostages, Cook said. While it appears more than 20 hostages were Iraqi security forces’ members and the remaining hostages were Iraqi civilians, that review remains under way.
“Five ISIL terrorists were detained by the Iraqis and a number of ISIL terrorists were killed,” he said. “In addition, the U.S. recovered important intelligence about ISIL.”
The Daily Beast’s Nancy Yousef has more on the raid and the Pentagon’s refusal to describe the raid as a combat mission. Additionally, US officials do not seem to know what the importance of the target was:
Even after the raid, Pentagon officials, who once insisted there were no American boots on the ground, continued to call the U.S. effort a “train, advise and assist” mission, not a combat one. It marked the latest game of military semantics in a war defined as much by its messaging as by its tactical results.
At a briefing with reporters, Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said the U.S. military was “not in an active combat mission” in Iraq. Cook repeatedly called the raid “unique” but refused to say whether the U.S. military had conducted similar mission before this one or whether anyone in the Iraqi government had asked for similar help in the past.
Rather he said Secretary of Defense Ash Carter approved putting U.S. troops in harm’s way because the Kurdish forces asked for raid and because both Kurdish and U.S. forces believed hostages had recently been killed; more could die within hours, they feared.
The U.S. military was not sure who it was rescuing, Cook said. In a statement, Kurdish officials said there were no Kurds among those rescued; they seem surprised and suggested that Iraqis had been rescued, instead.
According The Daily Beast, “dozens of troops from the U.S. Army’s elite Delta Force” were involved in the operation. If true, the military’s claim that the Special Forces troops were not engaged in a combat mission is implausible. Delta operators are highly trained door-kickers and not military advisers.
US special operations forces have conducted at least one other operation in the Iraq-Syria theater this year. In May, US personnel killed an Islamic State military and financial leader known as Abu Sayyaf and captured his wife, Umm Sayyaf, during a raid at the Al Omar oil field in Deir al Zour province in eastern Syria. An estimated 19 Islamic State fighters were also killed during the mission.
Bill Roggio is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Editor of The Long War Journal.
and this comment on Roggio’s take:
I think the Americans thought that there were some western hostages (John Cantile and others) due to some intelligence, but when they reached there, they found Iraqis instead, but still rescued them. That’s the only thing I could think of why they did a raid on this ISIS prison.
Statement from Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook On Hostage Rescue Mission in Iraq and sorry but we can’t pay you anymore ,it’s the GOP’s fault
Thank god we saved the Muslims.
Now, what about the Christians being slaughtered? Oh, wait - they don’t count, do they, Barry?
Do we even try to save Americans, or do we only save muslims?