U.S. uses helicopters for first time to hit Islamic State rebels

[candelista]

Source: Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military is flying Apache helicopters against Islamic State rebels in Iraq for the first time, exposing U.S. troops to greater risk from ground fire as they help Iraqi forces battle the Islamist group that has overrun parts of the country.

U.S. troops flew helicopters against Islamic State fighters on Sunday and again on Monday as they struck at mortar teams and other units near Fallujah, said a spokesman for Central Command, which is responsible for U.S. forces in the Middle East.

"This was the first time rotary wing aircraft were used in coordination with and in support of ISF (Iraqi Security Force) operations," Army Major Curtis Kellogg said in an email. "The Iraqi government asked for support with this capability near Fallujah to push back (Islamic State)."

U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the helicopters that were used were Apache attack helicopters.



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/u-uses-helicopters-first-time-hit-islamic-state-003125345.html

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Opinion from the article:

Richard Fontaine, president of the Center for a New American Security think tank, said the military's decision to use Apaches "demonstrates that they've only achieved limited results with the air strikes from fighters and bombers and drones."

He said the administration's effort to draw a line between putting combat troops on the ground in Iraq and providing air support for Iraqi forces was rapidly becoming "a distinction without a huge amount of difference."

"You know 1,600 troops in Iraq is boots on the ground, and air strikes and helicopter assaults is combat," Fontaine said.

[TwilightGardener]

1. CNAS is neocons by another name. They are itching for US troops in a ground war.

There is constant editorializing on the supposed futility of airstrikes, to pressure Obama into a much larger war--and yet, it's only been a few weeks. Let the air war work for a while, assholes.

[candelista]

3. So you want more of this?

http://freepressjournal.in/u-s-led-airstrikes-in-northern-syria-failing-to-stop-is-terror/

[TwilightGardener]

5. Airstrike strategy is not intended to recapture towns and territory, it's intended

to weaken ISIS's capabilities and hamper their movements. We don't yet have the LOCAL ground forces in place to recapture lots of territory, except in places with good fighters like Kurdistan, and it's futile to put American infantry and Marines on the ground in situations where the Iraqis and Syrians are in political and tribal disarray, won't help us fight, but would run away--or worse, turn on our forces. When the Pentagon said years, they meant years, unfortunately.

[candelista]

6. But you still want to do it.

You think we should go on bombing Syria "for years," as you put it. Well, I disagree.

[TwilightGardener]

8. Yes, I support airstrikes and hopefully getting local ground forces to kick out ISIS.

Right now I don't support a US-led ground war, because we do not have the local support and cooperation necessary to make that happen (or make it stick) in either country.

[ballyhoo]

2. No doubt what happens next. The ISIS

Caliphate against the US Caliphate with the innocents taking it from both sides.

[candelista]

4. The "US caliphate." :)

That gets funnier as it sinks in. +1.

[ballyhoo]

7. I figured you understood a long time

ago. I still don't completely understand the etiology of it all but, then, I am just a low-info former middle class voter.

[True Blue Door]

10. Despicably bigoted false equivalency.

And I notice you don't offer any viable alternative plan, unless your gloriously moral position is that we abandon an entire region to barbarism, ignore the pleas of everyone begging for our help, and passively wait for ISIS to strike our own people as they've threatened.

[candelista]

11. Yes, let's abandon them to "barbarism."

It beats this:



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/second-round-of-u-s-led-airstrikes-launched-in-syria/

[True Blue Door]

12. That pile of rubble beats a pile of beheaded corpses any day.

We're fighting for human beings, not buildings.

[ballyhoo]

13. We are fighting for human beings against

an enemy we created, armed and partially trained. Details on this have been posted continually.

[True Blue Door]

14. True. And that means it's our responsibility to take them out.

There aren't many problems in life that aren't in some way self-inflicted. And it's even rarer in foreign policy to be totally blameless.

The whole world let this happen. Some countries spoke a good game against Bush's psychotic Iraq rampage, but did nothing - not even economic sanctions. And more recently, we dithered while Bashar Assad massacred his people for daring to seek freedom. ISIS came out of those two ruins.

We might not be able to build a better future in the region with air strikes, but we can stop these vermin from taking it away from other people and pay them in full for the murders of journalists.

[ballyhoo]

15. I don't agree with your answer but at least you

understand what we've done. I would be more inclined to agree with you if the politicos that participated in the formation of ISIS resigned and new folks with fresh ideas were selected to take their place. The team in place now will simply continue the neocon strategy until ISIS is in South Texas beheading ranchers. When something like ISIS happens of the US's own energy, saying sorry to the world and whoever has been damaged just doesn't do it for me. I can understand your position too. Anyway, they'll be boots on the ground (more than the 1600 now there) after the election. That may help some, but with ISIS the enemy rather than Iraq, the battles will be different and the killings by the bad guys much more violent. My answer for right now is to do a few B52 type bombing runs in areas with sparse civilian populations (but enough ISIS knows we are now serious). As distasteful as it might sound, these killings should be shown in mainstream media to cause ISIS to be even more perplexed. The only way we will beat ISIS is a show of force complete with some psy--war stuff. I would explain the latter but you wouldn't like it.

[True Blue Door]

18. It's always tempting to indulge in armchair generalship.

I have my own ideas for the exact tactical and strategic approaches that might be taken. But what we as external critics can best offer is an overview, a synthesis - we can't possibly presume to know the details better than the professionals, precisely because of all the confounding political and diplomatic factors they have to deal with.

Except for the dimmer bulbs among them, ISIS won't be drawn into open-field combat where a B-1 or B-52 could just carpet bomb them into dust. They'll continue holding villages and cities, using the people as human shields, and doing everything else that makes terrorists the scum of the Earth.

The Kurds, the Shia, whatever sunni forces are willing to reject them, and perhaps eventually the Turks will have to be the ones retaking and holding territory. And that should be their responsibility anyway - it's their region, their immediate security at stake. If they can't control it, we'd be wasting our time anyway. But we can and should provide air support, training, supplies, etc.

[Bragi]

9. That changes everything! Not. nt

[RussBLib]

16. those will start getting shot down

...until last week I was totally opposed to the US sending in any ground troops, but I think I'm changing my mind. The ISIS assholes seem to enjoy beheading and killing. I don't think we can sit by and just watch it happen.

[GGJohn]

17. Those Longbow's?

They ain't that easy to bring down, their fast, agile, heavily armed and can take a lot of battle damage and still clear the combat area. Hitting a fast moving aircraft with ground fire is harder than one thinks.