Posted on 10/12/2015 6:42:03 PM PDT by markomalley
The Pentagon acknowledged on Monday that Iraqi forces could have discovered a cache of U.S. weapons and missiles seized by Islamic State (IS) militants operating in the country, according to U.S. officials and regional media reports.
Iraqi forces combatting IS (also known as ISIS or ISIL) are said to have found a stockpile of U.S. weapons, including ammunition and anti-armor missiles, hidden at sites controlled by terrorist forces, according to foreign military sources who spoke to Iran’s state-controlled Fars News Agency. This is said to include a “huge volume” of advanced TOW II anti-tank missiles.
When asked to address the reports on Monday, a Pentagon official acknowledged that U.S. weapons had gone missing last year, but denied that the United States was intentionally arming IS or its affiliates in the region.
“As you may recall, when ISIL overran Iraqi positions last year, we were aware of ISIL capturing some Iraqi weapons and equipment that had been supplied by the U.S. to Iraqi forces,” the official said. “However, the claims that U.S. and Coalition forces are directly supplying ISIL with any weapons, equipment, or ammunition are completely false.”
Fars claimed the U.S. weapons and ammunition were discovered over the weekend near the Iraqi city of Fallujah and that they had been “airdropped” into the area by American forces.
“The military hardware and weapons had been airdropped by the U.S.-led warplanes and choppers for the ISIL in the nearby areas of Beiji,” a military source was quoted as telling Fars.
The U.S. defense official rejected this claim, calling it “nothing more than propaganda intended to mislead readers about the true nature of the coalition’s efforts to support our Iraqi partners and defeat ISIL.”
Another Pentagon official noted that Iran often disseminates these types of reports and officials “regularly have to correct the record.”
Iraqi sources had claimed over the weekend that U.S. shipments had been spotted being sent to IS, though the claims could not be verified. Videos disseminated via Twitter appear to show Iraqis digging through U.S. supply crates.
The claims follow months of speculation among some Iraqis that the United States is wrongly arming terrorist forces in the country.
Such claims are a sign of a growing propaganda war on both sides of the fight, with the United States working to dampen conspiracies about its supposed support for IS.
Iranian officials and the country’s media outlets have attempted to perpetuate this narrative.
Fars quoted an Iraqi official earlier this year who claimed that U.S. aircraft were dropping food and weapons for forces believed to be affiliated with IS.
“The U.S. planes have dropped weapons for the ISIL terrorists in the areas under ISIL control and even in those areas that have been recently liberated from the ISIL control to encourage the terrorists to return to those places,” Jafar al-Jaberi, a coordinator for the Iraqi popular forces, was quoted as telling the outlet.
Meanwhile, U.S. coalition forces continue to strike IS positions.
The Pentagon announced on Sunday that it had conducted 17 airstrikes in Iraq and another seven in Syria.
“The strikes were conducted as part of Operation Inherent Resolve, the operation to eliminate the ISIL terrorist group and the threat they pose to Iraq, Syria, and the wider international community,” the Pentagon said. “The destruction of ISIL targets in Syria and Iraq further limits the terrorist group’s ability to project terror and conduct operations.”
Idiots all. This was truly a depressing night. I kept looking at the faces that were so gleeful and wondering how so many could be so naïve, stupid, uninformed, and totally lacking in common sense. I cannot forgive them.
And if ya don't believe Hussein, you can ask his wife Morgan Fairchild.
We've been living in 1930s Germany for the past two decades. We backed the wrong side in the Balkans and then toppled several secular governments in the Muslim world, sowing chaos in the vacuums we created. Now the bitter fruit is ripening. This is going to get ugly.
Hate to break it to ya Sen. Cruz, but we started the Syrian war, just like Libya and Egypt! Putin aint gonna let Bammy skate on that nation. I expect charges against him to be filed at the UN soon!
The US doesn’t ‘directly’ supply ISIS. It supplies other groups who pass the weapons on to ISIS. So the US appears to be telling the truth here.
And they voted for the fool twice and now they are all set to vote in Hillary.
Now that pisses obama off! He’s going to have to send them a whole new shipment.
That darned JV team.
Perfect, they were using a back door pipeline through Turkey to funnel them. Who knows where the money went as most of the arms Qaddafi paid for...
What Obama is doing is giving all the good weapons to Shia Iraqi military, instead of the Kurds who are much netter fighters. As soon as the Iraqi military hears gun fire, they abandon all the weapons and run for their lives. ISIS takes the weapons.
This method protects Obama from a charge of arming ISIS directly.
Ya think?
The jig is up and these fools in the pentagon just keep rolling out the administration lies
The Iraqis are not deceived
Nor is Putin
I feel bad for our brave spec ops troops who have to carry out odious orders to support the butchers of ISIS and Al Nusra/AlQaeda as “ allies”
Well a small blurb several days back did say that Erdigan “ seized” a “ mint” that was being used by the IS
Now Ya think Erdogan might have got back some of Qadaffi’s gold? Since ISIS had announced it was going to mint gold coins.
In fact I wonder if some double dealing by Sultan Erdogan might have led IS to carry out that huge suicide bombing in Ankara?
Lovely. So we are now arming ISIS? Shame on us.
Active Duty ping.
Well lets see, I was just walking down the Rail Road tracks and viola! Crates and crates of Tow Missiles.
Indeed it is the nature of business and life in that part of the world and has been for a long time
Turkey has been a conduit for many a deal, today it was announced we are pulling our missile defense batteries from Turkey...
Is this to prevent accidental lock and fire scenarios near the border, or removal of forces in that area for another purpose...
As you say, Biggy E is hungry and there is a lot of food about
Somebody is sending the GPS coordinates to ISIS. Cam’t be Hillary or Huma now that they’re server is down. Hmm who could it be?
Gold and arms funded the whole deal it was totally Black Ops and off the books...
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