Posted on 02/05/2015 10:29:34 PM PST by Reverend Saltine
The U.S.-led bombing campaign is doing little to stop foreign fighters joining the jihadist war in Iraq and Syria, The Daily Beast reports.
U.S. officials said about 4,000 foreign radicals have joined the conflict since the allied airstrikes began — nearly as many combatants as coalition forces claimed to have killed.
It raises concern that the Islamic State (ISIS) may be able to continue replenishing its ranks with jihadist recruits for years or even decades to come.
"The numbers are not moving in our favor," Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker said last week. The Tennessee Republican spoke following a closed-door briefing on Capitol Hill with retired Marine Gen. John Allen, President Barack Obama's envoy overseeing the campaign against the Islamic State.
According to Corker, when the strength of the U.S.-backed Syrian rebels is compared to that of the Islamic State fighters, "we are losing now in numbers."
The Defense Department says it has killed 6,000 enemy fighters since beginning airstrikes about five months ago.
But the intelligence community estimates that since September, 4,000 foreign fighters joined jihadist ranks. An estimate published last week in The Washington Post put the number higher, at about 5,000.
And those numbers do not include the number of in-country recruits that have joined the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, which could easily be in the thousands.
U.S. officials won't provide estimates of the number of new fighters entering Iraq and Syria, "but there are quiet concerns that the terror group isn’t significantly smaller than when the coalition airstrikes began," the Daily Beast reported. "It may have even grown."
Experts question the reliability of the Pentagon's "kill" estimates, arguing that drones and other forms of air power cannot accurately provide information on the number of Islamic State operatives killed.
The only way to confirm whether airstrikes are killing substantial numbers of jihadists is to have "boots on the ground or eyeballs on the target," said Christopher Harmer, an analyst with the Institute for the Study of War.
But "as long as ISIS shows the ability to continue to recruit foreign fighters, and regenerate lost manpower, then it’s an irrelevant metric," Harmer added. "I don’t know how long ISIS can sustain battlefield damage… but so far they haven’t collapsed."
The "bottom line," said Rep. Adam Schiff of California, ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, is that foreign jihadists continue flowing into Iraq and Syria to join the fighting.
"We have not been nearly successful enough in stemming that flow," the Democrat added.
Related Stories: Shocking French Video Aims to Stop ISIS Seduction of Young People ISIS Winning Recruits Throughout Western World © 2015 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
Let's see, there are now an extra 4000 dead muslims, and 4000 moved from civilized countries to Syria. So to me the numbers moved in our favor +8000. What's the problem?
“The numbers are not moving in our favor.” — The Defense Department says it has killed 6,000 enemy fighters since beginning airstrikes about five months ago.
Sheesh, just open the gates of hell to them. Kill 60,000. If that doesn’t slow them, kill 600,000.
Start building LOTS more A10s. How hard can this be?
We are not trying very hard. I saw Gen. McInerney on TV and he said that we are only flying something like 7 sorties a day. I think we should be flying 1,000 or so. It looks like Obola is not very keen on killing his fellow muslims.
Pretty good. We seldom killed Viet Cong or NVA in those numbers. Of course the VC didn’t rely on Allah to protect them or guide their bullets. In fact compared to the NVA or the NKs the Jihadis are a pretty incompetent bunch.
Advantage is it all seems to be drawing them out of the woodwork to where they can be dealt with.
It may take quite a while at this rate however.
I don’t see a problem. The Middle East is like a magnet for the radicals. Let them all go there. It will make it easier to kill.
The U.S. and western governments should set up a program of free flights to the Middle East for these radicals. Get them all together in one place, and then drop the bomb.
Usually people are so desperate for work that they forget to ask why there is a job opening.
I don’t think the US+NATO have the ability to run 1000 sorties a week, much less daily. This all was possible a couple of decades ago, at least for a short period, but no longer after all the defense cuts.
This will impact the democrat voting base.
I am not too sure about max numbers they could do but 7 is a pitiful effort. There are more than 7 flights a day out of most airbases during peacetime. I was on an airbase in Afghan a couple of years ago that flew a dozen or so fighter sorties on a slow day out of that one base, not counting all the other stuff they flew.
Exactly.
They're not really trying.
The problem is, as best I can determine we are killing about 3 ISIS terrorists per strike. They are breeding far faster than that, and to make it worse, our ROI is lousy.
Order up more planes and munitions!
It’s good that the lure of ISIS is drawing in more prey.
If coalition countries can keep them bottled up in certain areas, it will be like shooting fish in a barrel! AND, there will be fewer islamic terriorists.
(sorta kidding and sorta serious)
[ “The numbers are not moving in our favor.” — The Defense Department says it has killed 6,000 enemy fighters since beginning airstrikes about five months ago.
Sheesh, just open the gates of hell to them. Kill 60,000. If that doesn’t slow them, kill 600,000.
Start building LOTS more A10s. How hard can this be? ]
Not only that, but maybe send some damned armaments to the Pershmaga(sp) kurds too!!! The Kurds I have read about so far that are fighting ISIS don;t put their women in hefty bags and seem to be fighting WITH the Christians against ISIS in the area too....
Why is this so damned hard for Obama to figure out...
Oh wait the rat snake that is IRAN’s puppet is controlling Barry the puppet...
You forgot the “Whore of Babylon”...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R66wKOXhiks#t=28
that can bee seen on Barry’s right shoulder (the left side of the video) as he stumbles his way through the statement...
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