ISIS Defeated?

[*bfine32*]

Kudos to the GOP leadership for questioning the Admin's decision to pull Soldiers out of Syria and Afghanistan:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-senate-leader-wants-u-troops-stay-syria-192952490.html

Quote:The Republican leader of the U.S. Senate offered legislation on Tuesday urging the United States to keep troops in Syria and Afghanistan, as President Donald Trump's administration moves toward withdrawals of American forces after years overseas.

Does this mean that those that want us out of the ME will stand with POTUS?

[Stonyhands]

(01-18-2019, 12:15 PM)Yojimbo Wrote: I find it incredibly fishy that every time the intent of leaving Syria or Afghanistan is mentioned, there's a random attack that gives the MIC reason to stay, the media sells it and the public laps it up and cheers for more war. Which, the MIC is happy to oblige, right after they finish counting their money.

Our military simply being there helps ISIS and the Taliban recruit and add to their ranks, we are feeding their growth. Leaving is the only way to stop that cycle. If there is strife in the ME it is the problem of the U.N. and the ME to figure out.

Don’t bother...there’s zero winning any argument with any liberal hell bent on trashing our President. It’s literally as if they honestly believe Trump woke up one day and decided on a whim to do the things he has. It couldn’t possibly be a President fulfilling the campaign promises that got him elected by his supporters. Heaven knows they couldn’t possibly understand what it’s like to have elected a President that follows through on the very promises he’s elected for despite the constant criticism for everything he and his family does down to the clothes they wear. Criticism for actions and words spoken by previous and current leaders they had most likely voted for themselves. It’s real life lunacy!

[Au165]

(02-01-2019, 02:56 AM)Stonyhands Wrote: It’s literally as if they honestly believe Trump woke up one day and decided on a whim to do the things he has.  

...In many cases, yes I believe that is exactly what happens. People inside the White House have alluded to this being true in some instances haha.

[GMDino]

(01-31-2019, 07:39 PM)bfine32 Wrote: Kudos to the GOP leadership for questioning the Admin's decision to pull Soldiers out of Syria and Afghanistan:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-senate-leader-wants-u-troops-stay-syria-192952490.html


Does this mean that those that want us out of the ME will stand with POTUS?

It's not a matter of "standing" with DJT about pulling out.  A lot of us what to pull back our footprint in the ME.  It's about him saying we "won" and everything will be okie dokie and we're leaving right away.

He's clueless to how to lead and that is reflected in his tweets.

I stand with the people who make informed decisions...not the people who say whatever their gut tells them who then call the other side "uninformed" and tells them they need more education.

If Trump said the sky was blue I'd have to look before agreeing with him.

[SunsetBengal]

Seems like it's just about over.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/isis-has-been-reduced-to-15-square-miles-in-syria-this-is-its-final-stand/ar-BBT2ec6?ocid=spartanntp

[GMDino]

(02-01-2019, 11:06 AM)SunsetBengal Wrote: Seems like it's just about over.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/isis-has-been-reduced-to-15-square-miles-in-syria-this-is-its-final-stand/ar-BBT2ec6?ocid=spartanntp

Yeah, they lost their land...but they aren't a country, they are an ideology.  Lot's of ISIS members still there.

From what I have read and heard at least.  I'll try to find a link.

[SunsetBengal]

(02-01-2019, 11:15 AM)GMDino Wrote: Yeah, they lost their land...but they aren't a country, they are an ideology.  Lot's of ISIS members still there.

From what I have read and heard at least.  I'll try to find a link.

Wha??  You mean you don't take CNN's word for it?

[Dill]

(02-01-2019, 02:56 AM)Stonyhands Wrote: Don’t bother...there’s zero winning any argument with any liberal hell bent on trashing our President.  It’s literally as if they honestly believe Trump woke up one day and decided on a whim to do the things he has.  It couldn’t possibly be a President fulfilling the campaign promises that got him elected by his supporters.  Heaven knows they couldn’t possibly understand what it’s like to have elected a President that follows through on the very promises he’s elected for despite the constant criticism for everything he and his family does down to the clothes they wear.  Criticism for actions and words spoken by previous and current leaders they had most likely voted for themselves.  It’s real life lunacy!

 
What is Trump's Middle East policy, and how did his announced pull out fit into that? 

Also, was General Mattis a liberal?  Why did he resign last December when Trump announced he was bringing all the troops home "now"? Why have other foreign policy players like the Secretary of State and National Security Advisor done all they could to walk back Trump's announcement?  Why are our troops still in Syria, over a month later, with no exit date?

Without some meaningful answers to these questions, it is VERY hard to win an argument with a liberal, "hell bent" or not.  And nothing to do with "campaign promises."

[GMDino]

(02-01-2019, 11:43 AM)SunsetBengal Wrote: Wha??  You mean you don't take CNN's word for it?

I agreed they have lost land.  I disagree that they means ISIS is defeated.

[Dill]

(01-31-2019, 07:39 PM)bfine32 Wrote: Kudos to the GOP leadership for questioning the Admin's decision to pull Soldiers out of Syria and Afghanistan:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-senate-leader-wants-u-troops-stay-syria-192952490.html


Does this mean that those that want us out of the ME will stand with POTUS?

Ha ha, this is your "wedge" issue for the liberals, Bfine.  I stand with you on this one, though.

[Dill]

(02-01-2019, 11:15 AM)GMDino Wrote: Yeah, they lost their land...but they aren't a country, they are an ideology.  Lot's of ISIS members still there.

From what I have read and heard at least.  I'll try to find a link.

Very easy. Just Google "ISIS   Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Chad, China, India, Indonesia, Libya, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Yemen."

[GMDino]

(02-01-2019, 11:56 AM)Dill Wrote: Very easy. Just Google "ISIS   Afghanistan, Algeria, Bangladesh, Chad, China, India, Indonesia, Libya, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Yemen."

Ha!  I meant to the stats on ISIS...but your point is taken!

[SunsetBengal]

(02-01-2019, 11:47 AM)GMDino Wrote: I agreed they have lost land.  I disagree that they means ISIS is defeated.

Isn't the only real measure of how much impact/influence their ideology has determined by how much ground they occupy?  How else will they hold people captive, and force them to submit to said ideology, if they have no territory to have their ideology ruling over?

[GMDino]

(02-01-2019, 12:03 PM)SunsetBengal Wrote: Isn't the only real measure of how much impact/influence their ideology has determined by how much ground they occupy?  How else will they hold people captive, and force them to submit to said ideology, if they have no territory to have their ideology ruling over?

No.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/24/podcasts/the-daily/isis-syria-attack-us.html

More:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/21/world/middleeast/isis-syria-attack-iraq.html

Quote:“People make the mistake of thinking that when you lose territory, it’s linear — that they will continue to lose,” said Seth G. Jones, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the author of the center’s recent study assessing ISIS’ troop strength.

“When you lose territory, smart groups shift to guerrilla strategy and tactics, including targeted assassinations, ambushes, raids, bombings,” he added. “That is how you wear the enemy down.”


...


Three different reports released late last year — by the Pentagon inspector general, the United Nations and the Center for Strategic and International Studies — estimated that ISIS has 20,000 to 30,000 members in Iraq and Syria alone.
Those figures do not account for the thousands of fighters based in the caves of Afghanistan, in the scrubland of Niger and Mali, in the Sinai Desert, in lawless stretches of Libya and Yemen, and in the numerous other countries where affiliates of the group have taken hold.


Online, the terror group has repeatedly boasted about how the United States’ pullout is evidence that the Islamic State has outlasted the American operation.


In one video narrated by a well-known ISIS propagandist, Turjman Aswarti, the terror group brags that they are stronger now than the last time American forces withdrew.


“When Obama announced America’s flight from Iraq, the fire of our war was only burning in Iraq,” he says, according to a translation provided by the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors extremist content. “Today the flames of war are still burning in Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Yemen, Sinai, East Africa and Libya,” he said, naming the other countries where ISIS affiliates have flourished.




“It’s pretty obvious that the group today is vastly more powerful than the Islamic State of Iraq was then,” said Brian Fishman, a former director of research at the Combating Terrorism Center at the United States Military Academy in West Point and the author of book on the rise of ISIS.



Experts say the White House is mistakenly equating the group’s shrunken territorial holdings with its overall strength.





From its peak four years ago, when it held almost half of Syria and a third of Iraq, the Islamic State has now lost all but a fraction of the land it once held in the region.



But it has made a tactical shift to a guerrilla strategy, as Mr. Jones of the strategic and international studies group described it.



ISIS announced this tactical shift as early as 2017, in an article in Naba, its weekly newsletter, said Hassan Hassan, a senior fellow at the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy in Washington.



In the newsletter, the Islamic State compared its situation now with the tatters it was in before the last American pullout.




“It became impossible in early 2008 to continue the fight in its conventional ways,” ISIS said in the essay.




The essay explained that fighting detachments were abolished and the group’s remaining fighters were all trained in using improvised explosive devices.



“Instead of clashing with the heavily equipped American Army, compared to our small and underequipped one, the fight took an absolutely new shape,” the article said.


At the height of its territorial power, ISIS resembled a conventional army, at times rolling into battle with T-55 tanks.
Mr. Hassan has argued the group began the transition back to an insurgency as far back as 2016, a full year before it lost the most important center under its control — the Iraqi city of Mosul.





Mr. Hassan documented how, in early 2016, the group stepped up hit-and-run attacks in towns it had lost. These hasty operations appeared aimed at inflicting harm on these towns’ new rulers, with no intention of regaining territorial control.



Michael Knights, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, documented how throughout Iraq the group has focused with laserlike precision on killing “moktars,” or village chiefs, as well as tribal elders and local politicians.



There were, on average, 15 assassination attempts against local leaders each month in the first 10 months of 2018, by Mr. Knights’ count.


These targeted assassinations drew little coverage in the international news media, and yet they have helped undercut the trust Iraqis place in their government’s ability to protect them — as well as drive young men back into ISIS’s fold, Mr. Knights said.


“If ISIS can come to your town and kill the most important person in your town any night of the year, do you feel you’ve been liberated?” he asked.


The group’s current tactics mirror ISIS’ strategy a decade ago, which led to its rebirth.

“They realized you don’t have to mount 6,000 attacks per month,” Mr. Knights said. “You just have to kill the right 50 people each month.”

But, and this is important, DJT doesn't believe his intelligence reports unless they reinforce what he "knows".


 

[Stonyhands]

(02-01-2019, 11:45 AM)Dill Wrote:  
What is Trump's Middle East policy, and how did his announced pull out fit into that? 

Also, was General Mattis a liberal?  Why did he resign last December when Trump announced he was bringing all the troops home "now"? Why have other foreign policy players like the Secretary of State and National Security Advisor done all they could to walk back Trump's announcement?  Why are our troops still in Syria, over a month later, with no exit date?

Without some meaningful answers to these questions, it is VERY hard to win an argument with a liberal, "hell bent" or not.  And nothing to do with "campaign promises."

His policy is peace in the Middle East and not wasting anymore US Soldiers lives and US dollars on a never ending war in Afghanistan.


Color me surprised that a General rebuked any plans on drawing down our military presence.

Why are our Troops still in Syria? Why is this such a shocker to you? What exactly has Trump tried to do in his time as President that wasn’t dragged out or fought every step of the way? With the exception of confirming General Mattis to his position. Why would this be any different?

It’s not exactly unheard of for disagreements in policy between a commander in chief and those in positions such has General Mathis. Obama didn’t always see eye to eye with his Generals either and there were many disconnects during his presidency.

...and yes many would say General Mattis is liberal or leans more to that direction than he does toward being a conservative.

[Dill]

(02-01-2019, 03:46 PM)Stonyhands Wrote: His policy is peace in the Middle East and not wasting anymore US Soldiers lives and US dollars on a never ending war in Afghanistan.

Generalities. That's everyone's policy. 

With reference to those actually in power, this is a policy question. What is the PLAN for peace in the Middle East and getting out of Afghanistan?  What the specific goals in the process and the steps taken towards them. How does Syria fit into any larger Middle East strategy, and how does an abrupt pullout, which surprises Trump's own advisors and secretaries, accomplish that--especially when it turns out not to be a pull out?  It is with respect to already articulated policy that presidents generally explain their actions.  So what is Trump's Middle East/Syria policy?

(02-01-2019, 03:46 PM)Stonyhands Wrote: Color me surprised that a General rebuked any plans on drawing down our military presence.  

Why are our Troops still in Syria?  Why is this such a shocker to you?  What exactly has Trump tried to do in his time as President that wasn’t dragged out or fought every step of the way? With the exception of confirming General Mattis to his position.  Why would this be any different? 

You think generals want to keep troops in combat for no good reason?  Their judgments don't respond to military necessity?

It is still a "shocker" to me that our troops are still in Syria because in December, Trump announced he was pulling the out NOW, starting the day of the announcement. Our allies in the region have set plans for working with the US over the coming months, so this announcement took them completely by surprise. And it took our NSC advisor, Bolton, and our Secretary of State, Pompeo, and our Secretary of Defense by surprise as well.

We are still there because one of these gentlemen resigned and the others sat Trump down and explained what the costs of an immediate pull out would be. Then over the next week they traveled to Turkey and Jordan and Iraq to reconnect with leaders of those countries and their needs, not to mention our other allies on the ground.  Perhaps this is what you mean by "dragged out and fought every step of the way" knowledgeable officials trying to avert disaster as Trump "keeps his promises." 

(02-01-2019, 03:46 PM)Stonyhands Wrote: It’s not exactly unheard of for disagreements in policy between a commander in chief and those in positions such has General Mathis.  Obama didn’t always see eye to eye with his Generals either and there were many disconnects during his presidency.

...and yes many would say General Mattis is liberal or leans more to that direction than he does toward being a conservative.

It is EXACTLY "unheard of."

We are talking about a president who doesn't take his daily intel briefings and then announces a pull out with no preparation or advance warning, leaving his own administration and chaos and damage control mode.  NO OTHER PRESIDENT HAS DONE THIS.

Mattis has registered for no political party. But you think there must be some "liberal" in the guy if he resigns to protest an out-of-control president's actions?  Are Pompeo and Bolton liberals? They didn't resign, but they were just as shocked.  The Republican dominated Senate just voted to rebuke Trump's plan to withdraw troops from Syria and Afghanistan. This is about competence and national interest, not party.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vkZmYa7t1pU

[jj22]

ISIS is preparing to declare victory and gain respect...

https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/04/politics/pentagon-report-isis/index.html?utm_source=twCNN&utm_content=2019-02-04T15%3A56%3A04&utm_term=image&utm_medium=social

[jj22]

(02-01-2019, 02:56 AM)Stonyhands Wrote: Don’t bother...there’s zero winning any argument with any liberal hell bent on trashing our President.  It’s literally as if they honestly believe Trump woke up one day and decided on a whim to do the things he has.  It couldn’t possibly be a President fulfilling the campaign promises that got him elected by his supporters.  Heaven knows they couldn’t possibly understand what it’s like to have elected a President that follows through on the very promises he’s elected for despite the constant criticism for everything he and his family does down to the clothes they wear.  Criticism for actions and words spoken by previous and current leaders they had most likely voted for themselves.  It’s real life lunacy!

I know we shouldn't expect everyone to follow Politics like we do, but anyone who does knows "liberals" are on the side of Trump on this issue.

So this is a sad an uninformed case of fake news.

2020 Candidates are already showing support for the withdrawal.