Iraq - potential for airstrikes?

[GOOSE]

From Stars and Stripes

WASHINGTON — Senate Republicans on Thursday said U.S. airstrikes could be used to push back al-Qaida-aligned militants threatening the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.

Members of the Senate Armed Services Committee received a confidential briefing from Department of Defense Iraq and Middle East experts. Following the briefing, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said the situation was “chilling” and that the country was collapsing to Sunni Islamic fundamentalists bent on creating a caliphate in the Middle East.

Shock over the lightning advance of the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant, or ISIL, spread through Washington Thursday morning and by midday President Barack Obama announced that his national security team was “looking at all the options” for helping the government in Baghdad.

More here - http://www.stripes.com/news/middle-east ... q-1.288561

[Tom.Joyce]

Funny that this cropped up as only earlier tonight I was thinking about air strikes. I suppose it was only a matter of time though.

I was thinking about wether or not the B2's /B52's currently at Fairford would be kept on, with sorties flown from there..... But then I remembered that the B1's on rotation deployed out in Qatar (?) would probably be used as they are already forward deployed and ready to roll, unless there are political issues with sorties being flown from a.n.other Islamic / Arabian state ?.

The other point to consider against the deployment would be that the use of B2's would be serious overkill given that the Militants do not yet have access to any airborne threats, the real threat would be from Ground to Air systems and the fact that they would be operating over "Friendly" territory.

[Bushpilot]

Seeing that ISIS only have softskinned vehicles, dumb bombs from a B-52 would be the best option. Although whether DC would permit the use of Fairford and France/Spain would probably veto overflight rights something more local to Iraq would be more likely, if at all. Iran would have a meltdown if their 'brothers' were attacked by the great enemy.

[nigelblake]

Iran are offering to help Iraq
http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/06/12 ... rical-foe/

[POL]

Seeing that ISIS only have softskinned vehicles, dumb bombs from a B-52 would be the best option.

I'd have thought a couple of AC-130s would have worked far better and been far cheaper?!

[stealth1234]

Funny that this cropped up as only earlier tonight I was thinking about air strikes. I suppose it was only a matter of time though.

I was thinking about wether or not the B2's /B52's currently at Fairford would be kept on, with sorties flown from there..... But then I remembered that the B1's on rotation deployed out in Qatar (?) would probably be used as they are already forward deployed and ready to roll, unless there are political issues with sorties being flown from a.n.other Islamic / Arabian state ?.

The other point to consider against the deployment would be that the use of B2's would be serious overkill given that the Militants do not yet have access to any airborne threats, the real threat would be from Ground to Air systems and the fact that they would be operating over "Friendly" territory.

Considering the B-1's are deployed to such a place on a secret mission do you think you could not mention the country as to where they are based ? I have someone there thankyou.

Regards'

Mark

[seven]

The mission is not secret, just the US military have decided to keep the exact location secret. It has however been mentioned in the media and online as many times as the exploits of Katie Price, so on here i don't see a problem.

7

[Tom.Joyce]

Funny that this cropped up as only earlier tonight I was thinking about air strikes. I suppose it was only a matter of time though.

I was thinking about wether or not the B2's /B52's currently at Fairford would be kept on, with sorties flown from there..... But then I remembered that the B1's on rotation deployed out in Qatar (?) would probably be used as they are already forward deployed and ready to roll, unless there are political issues with sorties being flown from a.n.other Islamic / Arabian state ?.

The other point to consider against the deployment would be that the use of B2's would be serious overkill given that the Militants do not yet have access to any airborne threats, the real threat would be from Ground to Air systems and the fact that they would be operating over "Friendly" territory.

Considering the B-1's are deployed to such a place on a secret mission do you think you could not mention the country as to where they are based ? I have someone there thankyou.

Regards'

Mark

Mark,

Whilst I appreciate your concerns about naming a country where B-1's may (or may not) be stationed due to family circumstance, the fact is that I discovered this for myself by reading 2 books and then taking to Google Maps.
I haven’t used any other information or evidence from any other source to deduce this (that includes this site)
The fact is that I was (and still am) quite willing to be wrong in my statement as we all know that google maps can be months (if not years) out of date, and the books I have read were written based on events of the Gulf War – hence the question mark.
I certainly hope that all continues to go well for you family members currently deployed on foreign shores, and that they conclude their “business” successfully.
Best regards
Tom

[Jazz]

The mission is not secret, just the US military have decided to keep the exact location secret...

http://www.379aew.afcent.af.mil/news/st ... =123413511

[seven]

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[stealth1234]

Sorry I had no idea. I was just told the mission was classified I was just being Cautious about there safety.

No harm done

[seven]

Except the Buzzard..

7

[Tim Holden]

All that money we spent training and equipping the Iraqi army was well spent. Pictures from Tikrit show a tank park full of abandoned T62's, BMP's and MTLB's. They should have made mincemeat of a few yahoo's in pickup trucks, instead they just took off their uniforms and ran away. Half the militants are now weilding Iraqi Army M16's and driving around in tanks rather than pickup trucks. The Iraqi army is possibly the worst on the face of the planet.

[RichC]

Sorry I had no idea. I was just told the mission was classified I was just being Cautious about there safety.

No harm done

The B-1s are just the usual "RAMA's" you hear every few weeks. Except they have reverted back to the usual generic callsigns. Much like the E8C has done.
Certainly no secrecy or anything sinister. They are on CENTCOM rotation. Someone has put 2 + 2 together and = 55 (as usual) and then told everyone.

[Dunk]

Qatar is hardly a war zone, the B-1's have been their for several years, and it is quite common knowledge - so thread tidied, back on topic…

With a US aircraft carrier on the way, things look like they may well heat up.

[22A]

All that money we spent training and equipping the Iraqi army was well spent. Pictures from Tikrit show a tank park full of abandoned T62's, BMP's and MTLB's. They should have made mincemeat of a few yahoo's in pickup trucks, instead they just took off their uniforms and ran away. Half the militants are now weilding Iraqi Army M16's and driving around in tanks rather than pickup trucks. The Iraqi army is possibly the worst on the face of the planet.

One news reported summed it up
An army of 30,000 soldiers trained by America has fled in the face of 800 insurgents.

[22A]

With a US aircraft carrier on the way, things look like they may well heat up.

That announcement threw me. I thought carriers operated in pairs in case one had it's flight deck u/s for any reason. I presumed the news reader meant to say a US aircraft carrier group is being sent.

[RichC]

The former Iraqi army which used to be the fourth largest were not a bad fighting force when it came up against other neighbours. However when the Coalition invaded, they melted away and the majority formed the militia in which were very successful in neutralising US/British/Coalition vehicles by way of IED and insurgent style attacks.
They simply used the massive stockpile of Artillery shells and created massive and deadly IEDs. So rather than fighting face to face and knowing the enemy is a much more advanced and well training foe, they used their training/expertise in making use of the ordnance and weapons they had after the main army fell apart.

So, a vast amount of the militia now, no matter if they are Sunni or Shia, do have decent military training, they know how to use various weapons and a lot know how to drive military hardware. It's a shame that the current Iraqi Army are scared of the Sunni militia/insurgents. They (Baghdad) were looking to rely on the Peshmurger which are strongly against the Sunni uprising in turning Iraq into an Islamic imposed state much like the Taliban did to Afghanistan.
Peshmurger are well trained, well organised and well equipped and are mainly Kurdish. You'll find now that the Kurds will fight the Sunnis to the death and try and gain back Iraq in their favour.... of which the Sunni insurgents are pretty much scared of as they bypassed any city the Peshmurger are in control of in fear of being killed.

But, the US or even Iran which is now said they have offered military assistance (who would have thought) won't know any difference on the ground on who is Sunni, Shia, Kurd or so forth. Its going to very difficult. The only thing they can do is bomb Fallujah again (thats 100% sunni terrorist held with all civilians fleeing) as with Mosul.
It would be impossible to strike columns of vehicles because they'd need a JTAC there to verify the targets and call them in. However the US have clearly stated they won't be sending in any troops or even SF to do the targetting. They also know full well that their other option of using MQ9s is just as bad as calling in an F18.... you need ground intel first, and it has to be first hand and instant.

This is going to be a difficult one but knowing the US, they probably have SF knocking around anyway, even though they say they don't.

Best thing to do now, in the wake of it all being the Coalitions fault in the first place (as none of this would have happened under Saddam) is to let their former foes sort their mess out (Iran). As our intervention by air will only make things worse.

[Ronald Reagan]

I am ashamed to say I supported this Iraq disaster, I believed in Blair and Bush. I won't ever make that mistake again and was totally against our disaster of an intervention in Libya and was totally against us getting involved in Syria. The irony is that if we had removed Assad then these terrorists in Syria would control even more territory and be even more powerful than they are now. As one can see from the brutality from these terrorists, Assad and co simply cannot lose, from their perspective could you imagine the fate of the Syrian military and those loyal to the regime, in fact anyone at all who does not fit in with the ISIS view or that of other similar groups. From our point of view we should see Assad and his military as the vanguard against the terrorists in the war on terror. It would be far easier to deal with him than it would be ISIS, it will be far easier to deal with Iranian regime than it will be ISIS! Libya is falling apart to as I type. Saddam, Gaddafi and Assad could have been a very useful set of leaders to stop the spread of ISIS/Al Qaeda style groups within their respective nations. But our leaders rushed into that part of the world like a bull in to a China shop and now we are seeing the results. IF anything good can come out of this it will be an improving relationship between Iran and the west (if the USA will tolerate such a thing) and hopefully a reduction on the pressure Assad is facing from the west. If his forces for example could totally beat ISIS in Syria it could be very useful.

[rva65]

With a US aircraft carrier on the way, things look like they may well heat up.

That announcement threw me. I thought carriers operated in pairs in case one had it's flight deck u/s for any reason. I presumed the news reader meant to say a US aircraft carrier group is being sent.

The news media wouldn't know what a carrier strike group was even if it jumped up and bit them on the a**e ! and no carriers don't operate in pairs they are deployed singularly with escorts in there "areas of responsibility" !