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"I still say Kayla should be here, and if Obama had been as decisive as President Trump, maybe she would have been," Marsha Mueller said, referring to the death of her daughter at the hands of ISIS chief Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. "After Kayla's death, the Muellers became outspoken critics of the American government's handling of its foreign hostages. They had been encouraged to keep her captivity secret, and discouraged from attempting to free her or pay a ransom." Leaving aside the question of whether Obama ever had a good tactical option at rescuing Kayla Mueller, "decisive" is probably the wrong...

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was once held by the US in Camp Bucca Iraq. But the Obama administration shut down the Bucca prison camp and released its prisoners, including al-Baghdadi in 2009. The Telegraph reported: The FBI “most wanted” mugshot shows a tough, swarthy figure, his hair in a jailbird crew-cut. The $10 million price on his head, meanwhile, suggests that whoever released him from US custody four years ago may now be regretting it… …Well-organised and utterly ruthless, the ex-preacher is the driving force behind al-Qaeda’s resurgence throughout Syria and Iraq, putting it at the forefront of the war to...

US ISIS hostage Kayla Mueller was tortured and repeatedly raped by ISIS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi before her death in 2015. Kayla was held by ISIS for 18 months before she was killed. Other Western hostages were released by ISIS. Kayla was never released and died as an ISIS prisoner. ABC reported: Before her death earlier this year, American hostage Kayla Mueller was repeatedly raped by the top leader of ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, according to counter-terrorism officials. Mueller’s family confirmed to ABC News that government officials have told them that their daughter, who would have turned 27 on Friday,...

During the Obama administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement was not following proper procedures when checking if illegal aliens were known terrorists, jeopardizing national security, according to an audit. The office of inspector general found that between 2013 and 2015, ICE was not screening illegal immigrants who had been released for terrorist ties. Every single case of a suspected terrorist reviewed by the inspector general included errors. "ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) faces challenges in implementing the Known or Suspected Terrorist Encounter Protocol (KSTEP) screening process, which is used to identify aliens who may be known or suspected terrorists," the...

For years, a clandestine U.S. intelligence team had tracked a man they knew was high in the leadership of al Qaeda — an operative some believed had a hand in plotting the gruesome 2009 suicide attack in Afghanistan that killed seven CIA officers. Their pursuit was personal, and by early 2014 the agency had the target under tight drone surveillance. “We literally had a bead on this guy’s head and just needed authorization from Washington to pull the trigger,” said the source. Then something unexpected happened. While agents waited for the green light, the al Qaeda operative’s name, as well...

They wanted him dead. For years, a clandestine U.S. intelligence team had tracked a man they knew was high in the leadership of al Qaeda — an operative some believed had a hand in plotting the gruesome 2009 suicide attack in Afghanistan that killed seven CIA officers. Their pursuit was personal, and by early 2014, according to a source directly involved in the operation, the agency had the target under tight drone surveillance. “We literally had a bead on this guy’s head and just needed authorization from Washington to pull the trigger,” said the source. Then something unexpected happened. While...

On Monday, President Donald Trump laid out his strategy for the war in Afghanistan going into 2018 and beyond. While reaction to the strategy was somewhat mixed, there was one thing that stuck out: Wait, didn't former President Barack Obama say that we'd be done with this by now?  Why yes, yes he did. Let's take a trip in the way-back machine and look at some now-regrettable tweets, dug up by Fox's Stephen Miller:  FACT: Unlike President Obama, Romney has no plan to end the war in Afghanistan and bring our troops home.— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) October 9, 2012 As...

On Monday, President Donald Trump laid out his strategy for the war in Afghanistan going into 2018 and beyond. While reaction to the strategy was somewhat mixed, there was one thing that stuck out: Wait, didn't former President Barack Obama say that we'd be done with this by now?  Why yes, yes he did. Let's take a trip in the way-back machine and look at some now-regrettable tweets, dug up by Fox's Stephen Miller:  FACT: Unlike President Obama, Romney has no plan to end the war in Afghanistan and bring our troops home.— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) October 9, 2012 As...

Former president Obama’s wimpiness against foreign adversaries left the world a more dangerous place. That’s what ex-Obama officials Barry Pavel, Gary Samore and Michael McFaul said while praising President Trump‘s decisive actions in Syria and Afghanistan this week. “I think [Obama] left a more dangerous world,” Pavel told Fox News. Pavel was a senior director on the National Security Council from 2008 to 2010. Ex-Obama officials say hesitation to use force in Syria, elsewhere, emboldened adversaries https://t.co/Mqy8wDeIr3 pic.twitter.com/a1fSf87LAr — Fox News (@FoxNews) April 14, 2017 Pavel said America’s enemies knew that Obama “had the capability, but not the will” to...

Planning for the final assault on Raqqa, the capital of the Islamic State’s caliphate, had been grinding on for more than seven months. There had been dozens of meetings of President Barack Obama’s top national security team, scores of draft battle plans and hundreds of hours of anguished, late-night debates. There were no good options, but Obama’s top foreign policy advisers were convinced that they had finally settled on an approach that could work — arming Kurdish fighters in northern Syria, current and former U.S. officials said. There was just one problem: The Obama team had deliberated for so long...

“Turns out I’m really good at killing people,” President Obama reportedly said in 2011. “Didn’t know that was gonna be a strong suit of mine.” As much as his White House attempted to downplay that aspect of his presidency, it was a strong suit — if that rather glib term can be fairly applied to such a macabre achievement. Nowhere was Obama’s grim talent so evident as in his drone strike program, and now that his time in office has officially come to a close, we have his final drone kill count. Well, sort of. By the Obama administration’s own...

A pair of B-2 "stealth" bombers blasted two ISIS training camps in Libya on Wednesday evening, dropping 108 precision-guided bombs and sending jihadists scattering -- many of whom were then "cleaned up" by drone-launched hellfire missiles, U.S. defense officials told Fox News. The assault killed an estimated 85 terrorists at the camps, which were about 30 miles southwest of the Libyan coastal city of Sirte. President Obama authorized the action. Most of the terrorists targeted had escaped Sirte after extensive military actions there. U.S. drones "cleaned up" the operation by launching hellfire missiles that killed a several of ISIS fighters...

U.S. B-2 bombers carried out air strikes against Islamic State camps outside of Sirte, Libya, on Wednesday night, killing dozens of militants, U.S. defense officials said on Thursday. Two U.S. defense officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the strikes were carried out 28 miles (45 km) southwest of Sirte against two camps and done in cooperation with Libya's U.N.-backed Government of National Accord. They said there were no women or children in the camps. One of the officials said initial reports showed dozens of militants were killed in the strikes with more than 100 precision guided munitions dropped....

Barack Obama’s plan for military intervention in Syria was abruptly derailed by David Cameron and British members of parliament, US secretary of state John Kerry claimed on Thursday. The American president said he would bomb the Syrian regime if it used chemical weapons but he did not follow through on his promise. The failure to enforce his stated “red line” after President Bashar al-Assad used sarin gas in a Damascus suburb in August 2013 is seen by some as the worst stain on Obama’s legacy.

Four Gitmo detainees are slated to be transferred to Saudi Arabia in the next 24 hours, the first of the final wave of up to 20 transfers expected before Inauguration Day, two U.S. officials tell Fox News. The identities of the four detainees are not immediately known. The transfers are proceeding despite renewed opposition from President-elect Donald Trump, who tweeted on Tuesday: “There should be no further releases from Gitmo. These are extremely dangerous people and should not be allowed back onto the battlefield.”

Allied troops and ISIS are set to battle for a collapsing dam that would spew nearly 600 times the water of the River Thames onto Mosul if it breaches. Engineers from an Italian company have been tasked with fixing the Mosul Dam's foundations to stop more than 11 trillion litres of water (11.11billion cubic metres) from flooding Mosul. Experts are warning their work could be in vain, and should the catastrophe happen, it is estimated 1.5million people could be killed by the floods in an impact described as 'worse than a nuclear bomb'. Waves of up to 45ft would be...

TURKEY’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has claimed he has “confirmed evidence” US-led forces have supported ISIS. Erdogan said “it’s very clear” the US is supporting terror groups in a damning press conference in Ankara. He said: “They were accusing us of supporting Daesh (Islamic State). “Now they give support to terrorist groups including Daesh, YPG, PYD. It’s very clear. We have confirmed evidence, with pictures, photos and videos.” Casualties have mounted as the military tries to take the town of Al-Bab from ISIS jihadists and Ankara has become incresingly impatient over the lack of support from the US against the...

The Department of Defense and the Office of Military Commissions will allocate seats for news media aboard military chartered aircraft for travel from Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland to Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to cover military commission pre-trial proceedings scheduled for United States v. Khalid Shaikh Mohammad et. al., Jan. 25 - Feb. 3, 2017. Travel originates at Andrews AFB, Maryland on Monday, Jan. 23, 2017; return flight from Guantanamo to Andrews AFB, Saturday, Feb. 4, 2017. Due to a limited number of seats aboard the flight and limited accommodations at Guantanamo Bay, selection is not guaranteed. However, there...

Video You tube below At least 5 people are dead, 9 wounded, and an estimate 14 people held hostage in a standoff between gunman and local police in the Karak castle in Jordan. Four Jordanian police officers and a female Canadian tourist were killed in a drive-by shooting attack just outside of the castle, a popular tourist attraction 70 miles south of Jordan’s capital of Amman. Jordanian authorities say two separate shooting attacks took place before the assailants took hostages inside the Karak castle. Police have cordoned off the 900-year old Crusader castle, where the hostages, believed to be tourists,...

How did this debacle come about? First, in calling for the overthrow of Bashar Assad, who had not attacked or threatened us, we acted not in our national interests, but out of democratist ideology. Assad is a dictator. Dictators are bad. So Assad must go. Yet we had no idea who would replace him. It soon became clear that Assad’s most formidable enemies, and probable successors, would be the al-Nusra Front, the Syrian branch of al-Qaida, or ISIS, then carrying out grisly executions in their base camp in Raqqa. U.S. policy became to back the “good” rebels in Aleppo, bomb...