Tag Archives: ISIS

International news

Turks now feel brunt of ISIS’s monstrous wrath

AAhKMUE

Horror has struck again at a major international air terminal.

This time it’s in Istanbul, Turkey, home of the third-busiest airport in Europe, where 41 people were killed when Islamic State suicide terrorists opened fire and detonated explosives.

With each attack against a nation either in the Middle East or on its fringes — as Turkey is — the roster of nations aggrieved by ISIS grows.

The Turks have been on the front row of this fight since ISIS first surfaced in neighboring Syria. They’ve been a valuable ally of the United States in our own effort to eradicate the monstrous Islamic cult that has brought so much misery to the region and the world.

With each of these attacks, we see a redoubling of commitment by the nations that have been struck to do more to wage war against ISIS.

Jordanian citizens were killed by ISIS, so King Abdullah ordered a ratcheting up of air strikes by his country’s air force. Saudi Arabia has joined the fight as well. Russia witnessed one of its jetliners blown out of the sky and it, too, launched air strikes — ostensibly against ISIS targets in Syria.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/islamic-state-prime-suspect-after-suicide-bombers-kill-41-at-istanbul-airport/ar-AAhJukV?li=BBnb7Kz

This attack on Turkey ought to bring a fearsome and formidable new ally into a ramped-up effort against the terror cult.

Those of us on the fringes of this fight cannot know for certain what the Turks have done already to strike back against ISIS.

Many more families now are grieving the loss of loved ones because of these monsters.

A glimmer of hope, though, does shine through with the anticipation of yet another critical and powerful ally getting even more serious in this on-going battle to eradicate this hideous international menace.

International news, national news, political news

‘Stuff’ now rolls uphill, not down

I’ve always thought that “s*** rolls downhill.”

I learned it in the Army a few decades ago. When things went badly — which they did on occasion — the brass would make the rest of us down the line pay for the mistakes they might have made.

U.S. Sen. John McCain, though, sees it differently … I reckon.

He’s now blaming President Obama’s policies for the terror attack in Orlando, Fla., although his initial statement on that matter seemed to suggest that the president was even more directly responsible than that.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mccain-says-obama-is-directly-responsible-for-the-orlando-massacre_us_5762f78be4b0df4d586f9275?section

Sen. McCain more or less backed away from the statement, saying that the president’s “direct” responsibility is more a function of his decision to pull U.S. combat troops out of Iraq.

The absence of U.S. forces in Iraq, McCain said, brought about the birth of the Islamic State, which then spread to Syria and which has spread even farther into the Middle East — and which is now capable of striking the United States.

My head is spinning over this assertion.

McCain now says he “misspoke.” He didn’t take any of it back, though.

Look, the monster who slaughtered those 49 people in Orlando did it on his own. He reportedly was “inspired” by ISIS propaganda, but the American-born individual acted on his own in a fit of rage over something that has yet to be determined fully.

The blame game is getting tiresome. Sure, Democrats have taken no small amount of pleasure in ascribing blame to President Bush for all manner of things — including the Iraq War and its aftermath. It’s wrong to keep trying to pass the blame around to someone else.

The Huffington Post, though, reported this tidbit: “In 2010, McCain actually referred to it as a ‘victory’ when Obama pulled troops out of Iraq, though he said President George W. Bush deserved credit for the moment, too.”

Let’s get real here. Let’s also deal in the present day with these crises as they arise.

Laying blame on presidents of the other party — be they Democrat or Republican — only makes for snappy patter.

Oh … the politics of it all.

 

national news

Terrorists always are haters

hate terror

Hate crime or terrorist act?

As investigators sort through the carnage at that Orlando, Fla., nightclub where Omar Mateen opened fire with his AR-15, politicians, police and pundits are wondering whether Mateen committed a hate crime or an act of terror.

I keep asking myself: What is the difference?

Suppose the shooter killed those 50 people at a grocery store, or a shopping mall. Did he hate his victims? Would he have committed a hateful act? Yes.

We’re trying to parse the language a bit too finely, it seems to me.

The massacre occurred at a club called Pulse, a popular hangout for Orlando’s gay community. Mateen supposedly saw two men engaging in a public display of affection. It set him off, according to his father. He hated what he witnessed and was intent on acting on that hatred.

OK. He’s a hater.

What if Mateen, the son of Afghan parents and a Muslim, had declared himself in league with the Islamic State and then committed an act of radical Islamic terrorism? Police say he called 9-1-1 and told the dispatcher he had pledged allegiance to ISIS. He hated his victims just much in that context as he would have hated them merely because of their sexual orientation.

He’s still a hater.

Terrorists are haters. They hate the society against which they are striking out. By extension, they hate the victims they injure and kill.

Whether they target victims for specific causes, or just to terrorize them, they are haters.

I’m still trying to grasp the gravity of what happened early this morning as they were issuing a last-call advisory at that nightclub.

I believe Mateen committed an act of terror. He also was filled with rage and hatred. Let’s avoid separating the motives. They are linked by the level of their evil intent.

 

International news, national news, political news

Declare war against ISIS?

donald-trump

Donald J. Trump has this annoying habit of talking past whatever point he’s trying to sell.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee told Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly last night he’d be willing to consider asking Congress for a declaration of war against the Islamic State and other terrorist organizations.

I’ve talked already about that in this blog. It’s not an altogether nutty idea, unlike so many of the things that fly out of Trump’s mouth.

https://highplainsblogger.com/2014/09/time-for-a-declaration-of-war/

Then he goes on.

Trump told O’Reilly that the United States is letting “tens of thousands” of terrorists into the country.

Really? Tens of bleeping thousands of ’em, Donald?

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/trump-terror-declaration-war-223497

There you have it. The candidate of fear strikes again.

He tosses out statements with no basis in fact. There is not a single shred of evidence that “tens of thousands” of terrorists have taken up residents in the United States. Indeed, the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI, the Border Patrol, state and local police agencies, Drug Enforcement Agency and the whole array of agencies charged with protecting us are rounding up bad guys every single day.

As for the war declaration, I don’t have a particular problem with that, either.

However, I see it more as a proactive approach to fighting terrorists rather than as a reactive one.

Will it ever occur? I doubt it, not even if Donald Trump were to (here comes that shudder again) become the next president.

International news

Was it a terror attack … or something else?

egypt air

I’m puzzled.

Republican presidential nominee-in-waiting Donald J. Trump bellowed that he is absolutely certain it was a terrorist attack.

Democratic nominee-to-be Hillary Rodham Clinton said in more restrained tones that it appears to be an act of terror.

Greek aviation officials said mechanical failure likely wasn’t the cause.

FBI director James Comey has dispatched the finest investigators in the world to the scene of the tragedy.

Everyone seems to think the downing of EgyptAir 804 was the act of the Islamic State, or al-Qaeda, or some other nefarious, evil group.

Where, though, are the claims of responsibility?

History tells us that ISIS is quick to take “credit” for these evil acts. Al-Qaeda is a little slower to do so, but not this slow.

Indeed, terrorist groups want the world to know they have succeeded in committing these terrible deeds. In the case of this tragedy, 66 people have died. The jetliner was en route from Paris to Cairo when it veered 90 degrees and then spun in a circle before apparently plummeting into the Mediterranean Sea near the Greek island of Karpathos.

So, the question must be asked: Was it an act of terror?

The latest news is that sensors reportedly detected smoke inside the plane moments before it plunged into the sea.

Was it mechanical or electrical failure after all?

Let’s turn for just a moment to the politics of it all.

Perhaps you heard Trump say immediately that terrorists did this, that anything less than an all-out retaliatory strike against ISIS would be a sign of weakness.

Clinton didn’t want to be left on the sidelines, as she, too, sought to lay blame, although not with the bellicosity that Trump exhibited.

There remains a good chance that search teams will find the flight data recorders on the sea bottom. Absent any declaration of responsibility from terrorists, it would be wise in the extreme to see what’s contained in those recorders.

 

 

International news, military news, national news, political news

Hoping it’s true that we’re beating ISIS

carter

Oh, how I want to believe this assertion.

Defense Secretary Ash Carter says we’re turning the corner in the fight against the Islamic State.

He is pushing back against criticism — chiefly from the remaining Republican candidates for president and their allies in Congress — that we are “losing” the fight.

Carter and Joint Chiefs Chairman Joseph Dunford today told the media that the death this week of the Islamic State’s chief financial officer — the No. 2 man in the ISIS high command — illustrates the progress U.S. and allied forces are making in the fight against ISIS.

“The momentum of this campaign is now clearly on our side,” Carter declared.

Carter: We’re turning the tide

OK. Maybe it is. I have long endorsed the air campaign that we’ve launched against ISIS, believing that a concentrated aerial barrage of military targets could eventually destroy the monstrous terrorist cult.

Indeed, we keep killing ISIS leaders, not to mention the fighters who follow them.

Our allies in Iraq and resistance forces in Syria reportedly are taking back ISIS-held territory.

We keep getting news of “setbacks” and defeats of ISIS on the battlefield.

Is it true? Are these victories real?

Part of me wants to believe they are. Another part of me remembers a day when military leaders and their civilian bosses in government said the same thing about another war, the one in Vietnam. Americans were assured that more ground troops and greater concentrations of military power would demoralize the enemy and force them to give up the fight against a superior military machine.

It didn’t quite work out that way.

I know this fight is different. I also know that a victory declaration will be harder to come by.

We’ve all known when this war commenced that it required maximum patience among Americans.

My own patience is still pretty stout. It does, however, have its limits.

I just hope Secretary Carter and Gen. Dunford are telling us the actual truth this time.

 

International news, military news

ISIS’s No. 2 gets smoked; more to follow

ISIS leader

U.S. special operations forces had planned to capture the Islamic State’s reputed No. 2 man alive. They wanted to bring him in, lock him up and then interrogate the daylights out of him.

Then, oh damn! Something went wrong and the commandos were forced to fire on the vehicle carrying Abd a-Rahman Mustafa al-Qaduli.

He’s now dead. Too bad, right? Not at all.

The guy killed in the U.S. commando raid is thought to be the finance minister for ISIS. He’s also thought to have been able to step into the terror cabal’s commanding role if anything were to happen to Enemy No. 1.

Another one bites the dust

Well, he ain’t taking anything over now.

This is the kind of result we should hope for in this war against the Islamic State.

Does it mean the end of the murderous cult? No.

It does, though, put a seriously gaping hole in its command-and-control structure.

Sure, it would been preferable to capture the guy and question him. U.S. interrogators could have pulled a treasure trove of valuable information from him.

His death, though, means one more key ISIS leader is rotting in hell.

Keep up the fight.

 

 

International news, military news, national news, political news

Let’s get real, Sen. Cruz … patrol Muslim neighborhoods?

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cruz

Ted Cruz is reacting just like a politician seeking any advantage he can find.

The Texas Republican U.S. senator and a leading candidate for president, responding to the terrorist attacks that killed dozens of people in Brussels, Belgium, has called for law enforcement to “patrol Muslim neighborhoods” in the United States.

He believes “political correctness” and “fear” are preventing U.S. officials from doing enough to prevent terror attacks in this country. It’s time to “utterly destroy” the Islamic State and other terror cells.

No argument on the destruction of ISIS, senator.

But tell us, please: How are we going to define “Muslim neighborhoods”? Are there such enclaves in major American cities? Houston, which it Cruz’s hometown, has the largest Muslim population of any city in Texas. Where are those Muslim neighborhoods?

How about we concentrate fully on another course?

Let’s instead redouble our intelligence and military efforts to destroy ISIS, al-Qaeda, Boko Haram and other terror cells abroad. Hasn’t the federal government already declared its intention to “destroy” these murderous cults? Hasn’t the president vowed to protect Americans? Aren’t we killing bad guys each day with air strikes, using manned and unmanned aircraft?

And aren’t we intercepting efforts to bring terror to this country?

We should vow to stand with our allies who are grieving at this moment over the senseless and brutal loss of life in Belgium, just as we have done for allies in Paris and in all places where the terrorists have struck.

Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, denounced Cruz’s statement.

“It’s really beyond belief that you have one of the leading presidential candidates calling for law enforcement to target religious communities totally based on the fact that they are of a particular faith,” Hooper told the Washington Post. “In normal times, this would be the sort of thing that would disqualify someone from running for dogcatcher, much less president of the United States.”

Well, Mr. Hooper, here’s a flash. These aren’t “normal times.” We have this presidential campaign going on in the midst of a fearful climate — and candidates for the highest office in the land are likely to say just about anything to get their names in front of the public.

There’s a lot of fear being spread — not just by the terrorists, but also by politicians who think they stand to benefit from it.

 

International news

Now it’s Brussels …

brussels

Good morning, my fellow Americans.

We awoke today to more horror across The Pond. Terrorists have struck again, this time in Brussels, Belgium. At least 34 people are dead. All of them are innocent civilians. All of them presumably leave behind loved ones who are grieving.

Who did this dastardly deed? It’s a good bet the act has the signature of the Islamic State or some other monstrous organization.

It’s no coincidence, certainly that the attacks came just days after Belgian police apprehended the last surviving suspect in the Paris attacks of a few months ago.

The nature of our enemy cannot be condemned enough.

They attack so-called “soft targets,” which is another way of saying they go for the most vulnerable victims. They people just like the rest of us doing what they do normally.

Then their lives are shattered. Gone in a spasm of violence.

Yes, this fight must continue for as long as it takes.

The 9/11 attacks of nearly 15 years ago opened our eyes to the threat that’s always been there.

We went to war against the terrorists. How in the world do we declare victory against this evil that lurks among us?

Our hearts are broken yet again this morning as we ponder what’s happened abroad. Yet we must remain as vigilant as ever.

 

national news, political news

Trump saw it on Internet, which makes it true?

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Ezra Klein has hit on a matter that ought to send chills up the spines of even the most ardent of Donald J. Trump’s supporters.

Writing on Vox.com, the bright young journalist/researcher writes about something Trump said this past Sunday on “Meet the Press.”

Trump said the guy who rushed the stage in Dayton, Ohio, where he was speaking was a follower of the Islamic State. How did he know that? He saw something on the Internet, Trump said, which meant it just had to be true.

Is Trump too gullible to be president? That’s the question Klein seeks to answer. He seems to believe Trump’s gullibility disqualifies him categorically for the presidency.

As if he hasn’t disqualified himself already with all the countless earlier idiotic pronouncements he’s made.

The Internet is a valuable source for information. It’s also a source for nonsense.

For more years than I care to remember — perhaps ever since the Internet came on the scene — I’ve adhered to a certain policy: It is to believe the tiniest fraction of 1 percent of anything I read on the Internet. You cannot take seemingly anything at face value if you read it “on the Internet.”

I actually have spoken with people who submitted letters and essays to the newspaper where I worked with information that looked patently absurd, but who swore to me that it was true “because I saw it on the Internet.”

Trump’s assertion on national television Sunday morning that the stage rusher was an ISIS supporter based on Internet chatter demonstrates way beyond the shadow of any doubt of Trump’s unfitness for the office he is seeking.

The guy who rushed the stage? He’s an Italian-American named Thomas DiMassimo, a Christian … who denied immediately any ISIS allegiance. He said he was was just trying to make a scene.

Mission accomplished, dude.