Iraq

In early June, two Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias under the nominal control of the Iraqi government stormed into an Iraqi military airbase north of Baghdad. Driving armoured vehicles and wielding rocket launchers, they took over a building on the base. The Iraqi commander at the base, near the town of Balad, asked the militiamen to leave. […]

In the media of late, SEALs have been lumped in with a great many other SOF units seeming to be just another elite form of a conventional unit. However, due to their many unique assets, frogmen have an illustrious history with many noteworthy accomplishments outside of the predominantly land warfare mission of the last 15 […]

A small Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard vessel pointed its weapon at a U.S. military helicopter in the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday, two U.S. defense officials told Reuters on Monday, an action they described as “unsafe and unprofessional.” The incident is the latest in a series of similar actions by Iranian vessels this year, but […]

During a press conference this week, Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte again inveighed against the US, capping his rant by directing one his most frequently used insults against the British journalist who questioned him. “You did raise earlier the comparison with Latin America and narcostate,” Jonathan Miller, the Asia correspondent for the UK’s Channel 4, said […]

At least 80 people, many of them Shiite pilgrims on their way home to Iran, were killed on Thursday when an Islamic State suicide bomber detonated a truck filled with explosives at a roadside service station in southern Iraq, local officials said. The devastating attack came two days after Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi applauded the […]

Kurt: What’s your military background? Mike: So 2 years in the Marines and 2 years in the Army. I’ve realized I’m young and impatient so everywhere I’m at I’m always convinced I should be doing something better. Got bored in the Marines as a radio guy, so I tried to go SF in the Army and […]

Battle-hardened militants were far from the most terrifying thing for many women living under their harsh rule in the ISIS-conquered city of Mosul. “I was much more afraid of women,” said Umm Fatma, referring to female members of the terror organization’s morality police, known as the Hisbah. “The women would beat you for the smallest […]

First and foremost, no one really knows how American foreign policy is going to change over the next 12 months as the Trump administration enters the White House.  Staff members are still being selected, still have to be approved by Congress, and the Trump transition team is still figuring things out, sometimes as they learn […]

A vehicle shielded with metal plates and driven by a suicide attacker turned onto a main road filled with soldiers in eastern Mosul and burst into a ball of fire, causing several casualties. As it careered down the road it was riddled with gunfire as Iraqi forces responded to the latest Islamic State counterattack against […]

Tunneling underground is a tried and true tactic of the guerrilla fighter, one that has become especially prevalent amongst those facing Western air power which they simply cannot match.  By the same token, it has also been argued that the suicide bomber is another tactic which the guerrilla, or terrorist rather, uses to a militarily superior […]

It was a cold early morning in southern Iraq as I stepped outside and up to the B6 Land Cruisers parked next to the curb. I was on my way to assist another sister security company in completing a site survey for an upcoming contract near the Iranian border; about 300km from my location that […]

Blindfolded and bound, his knees pressing into the dirt, Imad resigned himself to what seemed inevitable: He was going to die. Islamic State gunmen had driven him and about 90 other former Iraqi police and army officers to a remote industrial area on the edge of Hamam al-Alil, 10 miles south of Mosul, after rounding them […]