Special Operations: Fighting For Permission To Fight

Archives

June 9, 2015: Although British and American special operations officers agree that ISIL (Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant) urgently needs more attention than it is getting, both the British and American governments are only allowing a small number of special operations (commando) troops to get anywhere close to combat with ISIL. These commandos are more often being used to train Moslem troops to fight ISIL.

Britain recently sent another 170 commandos to Iraq to train Iraqi troops that are deemed trainable. Most of these British commandos were sent to the north, where the Kurds have proved to me much more effective fighters than the Arab Iraqis. It is also believed that the Kurds have been more effective in assisting the American and British operators in carrying out their most dangerous tasks; reconnaissance inside ISIL territory. The Americans are also devoting more high-level trainers to the Kurds than to the Iraqi Arabs.

It was also confirmed that American and British special operations troops played a major role in developing and delivering a computer virus that recently did a lot of damage to ISIL’s wireless communications. Not only did this Cyber Warfare operation interfere with ISIL communications but made it easier to collect information on what ISIL was up to. This played a large part in locating the ISIL head of finance and making it possible to attack him and capture a lot of his records. The ISIL big shot died fighting but his wife, who was heavily involved in ISIL slaving activities, was taken and proved to be talkative.

The British and American are continuing to seek ways to get permission to do more to actually damage ISIL, but it’s an uphill fight.

 

 

Article Archive

Special Operations: Current 2023 2022 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 2015 2014 2013 2012 2011 2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004

X

ad

Help Keep Us From Drying Up

We need your help! Our subscription base has slowly been dwindling.

Each month we count on your contribute. You can support us in the following ways:

  1. Make sure you spread the word about us. Two ways to do that are to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.
  2. Subscribe to our daily newsletter. We’ll send the news to your email box, and you don’t have to come to the site unless you want to read columns or see photos.
  3. You can contribute to the health of StrategyPage.
Subscribe   contribute   Close