AmericanNazbro posted:

HenryKrinkle posted:

so is empowering the Iraqi Kurdish authorities a big part of the plan here? i've always heard they were among the most pro-US in the region.



It seems to be an integral part of the yinon/bush/biden plan to partition and balkanize the ME

The way conservatives talk about them, it reminds me of the 80s propaganda regarding the contras. They are also reactionary as hell + ally of israel.

That's why they own. The sons of Saladin.

AmericanNazbro posted:

it hasn't even been a week and we've already

lol dude you are way behind the times...................

stegosaurus posted:

Assadboys2001

Superabound posted:

ISIS is basically just the adult version of Slenderman

Ive been meaning to write an effortpost about ISIS-as-ARG for a while now, but I keep telling myself I need to finish these assignments i have first. Then I keep procrastinating and doing all kind of conspiracy effortpost anyway. I Want to Break Free

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/29/us-mideast-crisis-syria-idUSKCN0HO0EV20140929 posted:

U.S-led raids hit grain silos in Syria, kill workers: monitor
Mon, Sep 29 2014



BEIRUT (Reuters) - U.S.-led air strikes hit grain silos and other targets in Islamic State-controlled territory in northern and eastern Syria overnight, killing civilians and wounding militants, a group monitoring the war said on Monday.

The strikes in Manbij appeared to have killed only civilians, not fighters, said Rami Abdulrahman, who runs the Observatory which gathers information from sources in Syria.

"These were the workers at the silos. They provide food for the people," he said. He could not give a number of casualties and it was not immediately possible to verify the information.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/30/us-mideast-crisis-wheat-idUSKCN0HP12J20140930 posted:

Special Report: Islamic State uses grain to tighten grip in Iraq
BY MAGGIE FICK
Tue Sep 30, 2014 5:19pm EDT



SHEKHAN, Iraq (Reuters) - For Salah Paulis, it came down to a choice between his faith and his crop.

A wheat farmer from outside Mosul, Paulis and his family fled the militant group Islamic State early last month. The group overran the family farm as part of its offensive that captured vast swathes of territory in northern Iraq. Two weeks later, Paulis, who is a Christian, received a phone call from a man who said he was an Islamic State fighter.

“We are in your warehouse. Why are you not here working and taking care of your business?” the man asked in formal Arabic. “Come back and we will guarantee your safety. But you must convert and pay $500.”

When Paulis refused, the man spelled out the penalty. “We are taking your wheat,” he said. “Just to let you know we are not stealing it because we gave you a choice.”

Other fleeing farmers recount similar stories, and point to a little-discussed element of the threat Islamic State poses to Iraq and the region.

The group now controls a large chunk of Iraq’s wheat supplies...

The group has begun using the grain to fill its pockets, to deprive opponents – especially members of the Christian and Yazidi minorities – of vital food supplies, and to win over fellow Sunni Muslims as it tightens its grip on captured territory. In Iraq’s northern breadbasket, much as it did in neighboring Syria, IS has kept state employees and wheat silo operators in place to help run its empire...

A SILO UNDER ATTACK

IS attacked Makhmur on August 7. But even in the weeks before that, the group had found a way into the silo and the Iraqi state procurement system.

Abdel Rizza Qadr Ahmed, head of the silo, believes that IS forced local farmers to mix wheat produced in other, IS-controlled areas into their own harvest. The farmers then sold it to Makhmur as if it all had been grown locally. In the weeks before the attack, the silo purchased almost 14,000 more tonnes than it had in 2013. That extra wheat is worth approximately $9.5 million at the artificially high price Baghdad pays farmers...

Huner Baba, local director general of agriculture, said he too believed that traders and farmers had sold wheat from outside the region.

But Baghdad usually pays its wheat farmers around two months after they deposit their produce and so wheat farmers around Makhmur – and therefore IS – had not yet been paid by the time IS militants entered the town on June 7 and, according to Baba, headed for the silo.

The militants were met by Iraqi Kurdish fighters, known as Peshmerga, and fighters from the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK). After IS took the silo, Baba said, they installed snipers there. He speculates that the militants believed U.S. warplanes would not strike the facility, which is in the center of town.

“They want to get people on their side especially the Arabs. Maybe that’s why they didn’t do anything to the wheat, not to anger people,” he said.

IS held Makhmur for three days before the Kurdish fighters and U.S. air strikes on IS positions – though not on the silo – drove them out. U.S.-led air strikes did hit grain silos in the northern Syrian town of Manbij on Sept 28. A group monitoring the war said the aircraft may have mistaken the mills and grain silos for an Islamic State base. There was no immediate comment from Washington.

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/isis-terror/iraq-pilots-mistakenly-gave-food-ammunition-isis-militants-n214956 posted:

Iraq Pilots Mistakenly Gave Food, Ammunition to ISIS Militants
NBC News staff
First published October 1st 2014, 1:36 am



Iraqi military pilots mistakenly gave food, water and ammunition to enemy ISIS militants instead of their own soldiers, a senior security official and a brigadier-general told NBC News. The supplies were supposed to help besieged Iraqi army officers and soldiers who had been fighting Islamist extremists for a week in Saglawyah and the village of Al-Sijar in the country’s western province of Anbar.

“Some pilots, instead of dropping these supplies over the area of the Iraqi army, threw it over the area that is controlled by ISIS fighters,” said Hakim Al-Zamili, a lawmaker in the Iraqi parliament who is a member of the security and defense committee and acts as a security liaison for service members and commanders formed by anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. “Those soldiers were in deadly need of these supplies, but because of the wrong plans of the commanders in the Iraqi army and lack of experience of the pilots, we in a way or another helped ISIS fighters to kill our soldiers.”

A brigadier-general in Iraq’s Defense Ministry, who declined to be named, confirmed the incident, which occurred on Sept. 19. “Yes, that's what had happened,” the officer said, adding that some air force pilots “do not have enough experience … they are all young and new.” Both Al-Zamili and the brigadier-general said there would be an investigation to determine the cause of the blunder.