-in-iraq.html
Looks like we lack the capability to do anything even if we wanted to at
this point...particularly with all the scruples we have nowadays against
accidently hitting the wrong people. Contrast this with the fact that 15,000
French civilians were unintentionally killed by allied bombing during the
invasion of Normandy 70 years ago. As Mark Steyn has observed America 70
years later lacks the political will to win a war.
"The U.S. military has the capability to conduct air strikes over Iraq
within hours. The problem is they don't know exactly who they are supposed
to be targeting."
President Obama is repositioning military assets closer to Iraq, in case he
wants to strike at the terrorists that are threatening to tear the country
apart. The problem is, the U.S. doesn't know who it's supposed to hit.
Current and retired American defense and intelligence officials tell The
Daily Beast that the CIA and the Pentagon are not certain who exactly makes
up the forces that have taken so much of Iraq. Moreover, these intelligence
and defense officials says that they believe that some of the people
fighting with Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) are former U.S.
allies who could be turned against the hard-core fanatics-if they can be
identified.
"We don't have boots on ground providing intelligence and we don't have
confidence in information that the Iraqi government provides, because
they've [been] so heavy-handed in the use of force against Sunni villages,"
said Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., a senior member of the House Intelligence
Committee.
In other words, the American intelligence community is only now scrambling
to draw up a potential target list in Iraq, and possibly Syria-even though
the threat of ISIS has been visibly growing for years. And while the
analysts are trying to figure out who they should zero in on, Obama
administration lawyers are wrestling with what legal authorities the
president might have to carry out an attack.
By Epictetus
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