Has Syria declared war on the USA yet? I mean, they have ever legal justification to do so. I haven't heard about it if they have, but we're taking actions that could certainly precipitate a war and if another country did it to us we already would have made the declaration.

10/8/2014 12:10:06 AM

NATO is about to get pulled into Turkey

10/8/2014 8:57:20 AM

I'm pretty sure Assad is ok with US bombing ISIS.

10/8/2014 11:56:19 AM

http://washington.cbslocal.com/2014/10/08/gop-rep-at-least-ten-isis-fighters-have-been-caught-coming-across-the-mexican-border/

10/8/2014 7:09:09 PM

Quote :

"The Department of Homeland Security released a statement on Wednesday that claims alleging Islamic State militants have been apprehended at the Mexican border are “categorically false.” “The suggestion that individuals who have ties to ISIL have been apprehended at the Southwest border is categorically false, and not supported by any credible intelligence or the facts on the ground,” a DHS spokesman said in a statement today. “DHS continues to have no credible intelligence to suggest terrorist organizations are actively plotting to cross the southwest border.” "

Seems criminal if that Rep lied about this, on a national news network.

10/8/2014 9:04:11 PM

All the GOP has right now to rally the base is security (ISIS and Ebola) and immigration. Wrapping them together with ISIS soldiers carrying weaponized Ebola across the Mexican border is just a natural progression. They have a lot of work to do to get the geriatrics motivated I vote (ie scared out of their minds)

10/9/2014 7:37:42 AM

Why did I read the comments on that piece? Why?????

10/9/2014 9:35:16 AM

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/10/kurdish-woman-suicide-bomber-attacks-isis-in-syria-killing-a-number-of-members/

10/10/2014 8:53:16 AM

Hooray?

10/10/2014 6:07:33 PM

To keep up with China's economic growth we have to give shit to isis just so we can blow them up and sell them to ourselves to hand out again.

10/10/2014 8:23:51 PM

The guy live tweeting the battle for Kobani is pretty funny and incredibly strange.

https://twitter.com/cahitstorm

10/11/2014 1:32:28 AM

I saw some congressman is calling for 300k us troops in iraq as the only way to stop isis.

10/13/2014 5:24:08 PM

The "Obama doctrine" seems to be "let the iraqis do the fighting."

It's a little risky, but I think it's worth trying.

10/13/2014 5:32:00 PM

the iraqi's have no interest in protecting anything but shia areas. Hoepfully this will lead to a 3-way partition.

10/13/2014 6:35:06 PM

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/10/13/gruesome-photos-may-show-isis-using-chemical-weapons-on-kurds-says-report/

10/13/2014 7:49:34 PM

I said:

Quote :

"what will be interesting is to see how Turkey handles the PKK, seems like this is an opportunity for Turkey to weaken the PKK 10/2/2014 1:50:15 PM"

Turkey is bombing PKK targets:

Turkish jets bomb Kurdish PKK rebels near Iraq
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-29611582

10/14/2014 11:20:30 AM

Quote :

"i don't trust turkey. they consider much of the kurd leadership, who are currently the only ones fighting isis, to be terrorists. I wouldn't be surprised if Turkey went in with plans to clean all of them out of the border area. Also, if they weaken Isis, they strengthen the kurds and unite the Kurdish state which also wants to overthrow Turkish rule of Kurdistan. It isn't outside the realm of possibility for Southern Turkey to become another Syria where the Turkish government is fighting everyone including Isis."

you could tell by the pixels of them not fighting isis. turkey damn near supports isis.

10/14/2014 5:36:21 PM

Inherent Resolve!!
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/10/15/inherent-resolve-military-campaign-against-isis-gets-name/

10/15/2014 2:02:23 PM

We just fropped weapons to isis. Every syrian will hate us as soon as this is all over.

10/21/2014 7:47:51 PM

wtf

http://shoebat.com/2014/10/25/man-connecticut-goes-random-womans-backyard-strips-completely-naked-rapes-pit-bull-says-member-isis-great-massacre-coming/

10/27/2014 5:34:18 AM

typical.

10/27/2014 7:39:21 AM

is ^^ website serious or satire?

10/27/2014 8:39:14 AM

^^ what's typical, and of whom?

^ it is serious. see:

http://shoebat.com/2014/10/26/muslims-take-young-girl-girl-begs-mercy-says-please-forgive-muslims-show-mercy-smash-death-rocks/

WARNING: Video shows woman stoned to death (by her own father)

10/28/2014 1:43:31 AM

typical... of you. posting an article of dubious origin about deviant sexual behavior.

[Edited on October 28, 2014 at 8:17 AM. Reason : ]

10/28/2014 8:16:38 AM

the story is real; it made regular cable news channels

this weirdo just prefers to post "www.sniffdingleberrynews.com/pitbullrape.html" etc whenever something catches his eye

hes like the lewisje of news rather than comics

10/28/2014 9:15:10 AM

real news websites are probably blocked or censored for him

10/28/2014 9:39:48 AM

I heard on NPR that ISIS is creating a lot of false chatter to try and throw off our bombing locations. Couldn't figure out exactly what that meant but does "weeding out false chatter" mean they are pretending to be somewhere that they aren't or mean they are sending blank messages with no information to bury their own communication?

10/29/2014 7:36:03 PM

http://www.wral.com/obama-authorizes-1-500-more-troops-for-iraq/14159980/

11/7/2014 4:04:17 PM

Quote :

"Mission creep like a mofo"

11/7/2014 9:39:27 PM

Don't know why everyone keeps throwing around "NATO member" when talking about Turkey in this case. NATA means "Fuck Russia" not "Fuck ISIS" and destroying ISIS actually helps Assad thus Russia.

11/12/2014 5:12:06 PM

These guys are hurting pretty bad right now. The group's overall momentum has totally stalled out. They haven't made any gains since the strikes started and are being blunted or pushed back on all fronts. This past weekend a bunch of their leadership including al-Baghdadi were hit as well. Sounds like we're listening to all their electronic communication and they can't hide from our bombs. A month ago the media narrative made these dudes sound like unstoppable supervillains, but it turns out they are the same dumb assholes we've gotten very good at blowing up over the years out there.

11/12/2014 5:59:01 PM

Quote :

"These guys are hurting pretty bad right now. The group's overall momentum has totally stalled out. They haven't made any gains since the strikes started and are being blunted or pushed back on all fronts."

The geography works against them and pretty much means they can't go out any further and hold onto their gains. It's one reason why the U.S. invasions in the Persian Gulf War and the Iraq War from Kuwait went so seamlessly is there are no topographical features to aid in defense, so ISIS could take land but it wouldn't mean much.

11/13/2014 9:52:18 AM

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2014/09/saudi-unveils-900km-fence-along-iraq-border-201496154458789238.html

Thats what you call border control.

They also have radar, ir and armed patrols protecting the fence.

11/17/2014 11:21:17 PM

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/isis-suffers-heaviest-defeat-iraq-101500786.html?soc_src=copy

Quote :

"Over the last 24 hours, ISIS has been defeated in every front in Iraq in unprecedented way. From Mosul to the north to Anbar to the west and Diyala to the east, Iraqi government forces, Shiite militias, Sunni tribes and Kurdish forces were all victorious in battle. Since the start of the U.S.-led air campaign, ISIS has lost its momentum in Iraq and lost some of the cities and towns that it captured in June 2014. It still controls the provincial capitals Mosul and Tikrit as well as the city of Fallujah west of Baghdad, and many other small towns throughout."

Welp.

1/22/2015 5:59:54 PM

Appalling barbarism. These guys are animals..

But everyone should have seen this coming to the Jordanian guy.

2/3/2015 12:12:32 PM

Those guys really know how to win over the hearts and minds of their fellow countrymen

2/3/2015 12:27:36 PM

I don't know what the hell I was thinking watching that video right after dinner. Made me a little bit queasy. These stupid idiots are making it so that people like me that think we really have no business bothering with the Middle East decide that stamping out this sort of savagery is well worth it to all of mankind.

2/3/2015 9:13:43 PM

Goddamn I wish I was back over there and killing them.

[Edited on February 3, 2015 at 10:34 PM. Reason : ]

2/3/2015 10:34:07 PM

While these types of incidents happen in isolation during times of violence by undisciplined forces, this sort of deliberate action by an organization, topped with a slickly edited video to celebrate and advertise this sort of barbarism, takes it to a whole different, horrific level.

You can terrorize people in submission to a point, but when your terror goes into full psycho mode, people are going to decide that its better to fight you even at a high price than submit to that. I think this is the case in Jordan, where if IS were rational, they could have done a "normal" execution of the pilot to try and fuel the anti-war movement there. Instead, they decide to take it to a new low and unify a divided Jordan against them.

IS has demonstrated to the world that it is nothing more than a group of sadistic serial killers hiding behind a thin veil of ideology and political ire to justify murder and torture. They're like the Shankill Butchers from the Irish Troubles, a bunch of psychopaths using politics as an excuse to feed their blood-thirsty appetites.

2/4/2015 12:29:25 AM

yep, i think they are fucking up. they enjoy an advantage of a war-weary West, and also a Western/regional coalition that isn't super enthused about doing anything that is a net benefit to Assad. They could probably have largely gotten away with the status quo of a few months ago. If they hadn't overplayed their hand before, I think they definitely have in the last week or so.

I'm not convinced that they are just Lord of the Flies with a Quran. I think they are mostly extreme zealots, with a significant component of desire for geopolitical power.

2/4/2015 12:40:22 AM

I don't think there is much question what the group is all about and it surely isn't Islam. That is just a vehicle for recruitment..

[Edited on February 4, 2015 at 7:57 AM. Reason : X]

2/4/2015 7:56:41 AM

I think the interview with the pilot's father spoke best. Prior to his execution, the father, and a very large faction of people in Jordan, had a strong anti-war position, questioning the government's decision to wage war against "fellow Muslims" on behalf of the West. Now though, given the unnecessarily brutal and sadistic way they murdered that pilot, he is calling for the annihilation of ISIL, and the momentum the anti-war movement in Jordan has pretty much evaporated. Large portions of Jordan that may have harbored sympathies for ISIL are now hardening against them.

As for recruitment, executing westerners quickly is one thing, but this... the only type of people you are going to recruit are fellow psychopaths. If they were targeting a mainstream audience though, this is not going to help their cause. They overstepped.

2/4/2015 12:19:34 PM

Totally agreed with the last 4 posts.

2/4/2015 3:30:01 PM

^^^ See I'm not so sure about that. My guess is that the proportion varies from person to person within the organization. In other words, I think that they are probably almost all sincerely devout (if horribly misguided) Muslims. To some, that is probably the primary motivation. To others, it's probably more about power, etc, and the Islam factor is there, but secondary.

2/4/2015 7:51:34 PM

They should have stopped after Mosul and focused on consolidation instead of acting like raiding barbarians to the nearby settlements. We started bombing these assholes to stop a massacre of not-muslims near Kurdish oil. Had they just not done that, we were totally fine with ISIS flags peppering a third of Iraq. Wasn't our problem.

2/4/2015 7:56:09 PM

pretty much

(* I don't know about "fine with", but we weren't going to make a serious, overt effort to stop them until they put us in a position where we didn't have much of a choice)

2/4/2015 8:06:03 PM

they are not "fucking up" by agitating the west, they are doing it on purpose. they want the west to come and fight there, they have to be barbaric or we will ignore them. this is a repeated pattern by terrorists in that region, i'm amazed that anyone can not realize they are goading the west into intervention on purpose

[Edited on February 4, 2015 at 8:32 PM. Reason : .]

2/4/2015 8:31:37 PM

of course they are; I'm arguing that they're overdoing it and are going to get TOO much intervention.

2/4/2015 8:58:20 PM

Quote :

" i'm amazed that anyone can not realize they are goading the west into intervention on purpose "

To what end? They are cool with all of our mighty wrath so long as they kill a few infidels in the process? Like, if it is 1 infidel to 1000 of these chumps then Allah is happy thus they march on with this savagery?

2/4/2015 10:19:24 PM

no, they are much more strategic thinking than that, I think.

At the strategic level, for at least a couple of decades, Islamists have been trying to goad the West into reaction, and preferably overreaction, in the Muslim world. I think that's half of why bin Laden orchestrated 9/11--he'd seen that bombing the World Trade Center, bombing the Cole, blowing up embassies, etc didn't have sufficient effect. His/their purpose is to leverage hatred of Western/U.S./non-Muslim meddling & military action in the Muslim world to galvanize an otherwise fractured Muslim world into the caliphate they have wanted since approximately forever ago.

At what I suppose I'd call the operational level, Western intervention fuels their recruitment efforts and probably at least some public sympathy to their cause.

There is a fine line between behaving in a way that conveys strength, commands attention, and drives enough outside intervention to keep fueling things, and overstepping that line to the point where they lose support.

2/4/2015 10:43:12 PM