Islamic State fighters have launched an assault on Kobani, a strategically located Kurdish town in Syria roughly 6 miles from Turkey. (Photo: Reuters)
Despite U.S. airstrikes selectively hitting Islamic State targets in Syria and Iraq, Kurdish fighters confirmed the terror army still advances on the Syrian town of Kobani. Rooz Bahjat, a senior Kurdish military officer, said upwards of 400,000 residents and refugees are trapped, while 70,000 refugees have already fled across the border into Turkey. Still, hundred of thousands more, including women, are staying behind to fight the advancing terror army.
“Tell the world what is happening” Bahjat said Wednesday on the phone to a Fox News reporter. “This could be a massacre if no help arrives.”
The Kurdish people are both the only truly pro-U.S. and pro-West Arab nation in the Middle East and the most-capable fighting force mentioned in Obama’s ISIS strategy. However, as D.C.-pundits argue the merits of Obama’s no “boots on the ground” strategy, the reality that airpower is insufficient is undeniable to allies on the ground. The bottom line is that in the absence of further U.S. action they are threatened with mass genocide.
As of last night, the town of Kobani was surrounded by ISIS tanks, artillery and mortars, American weapons largely stolen from depots insufficiently protected in the absence of U.S. troops. Bahjat said hours ago that they were just miles from the city limits.
“What happened on Mount Sinjar will seem like nothing compared to this if ISIS gets through,” Bahjat said, citing the Iraqi mountain village where thousands of religious minorities were trapped without food and water. They had been under siege from ISIS until U.S. airstrikes broke the siege. “They have now surrounded the city and are fighting on all sides.”
“Those airstrikes are not important. We need soldiers on the ground,” said Hamed, a refugee speaking to Reuters said as he fled into Turkey. However, as the Kurds and others make desperate pleas to the U.S., President Obama’s ISIS strategy and his rhetoric still struggling to reconcile themselves, a luxury the Kurds do not have.
“The only language understood by killers like this is the language of force. So the United States of America will work with a broad coalition to dismantle this network of death,” President Obama said speaking to the U.N. General Assembly Wednesday. But he was quick to walk it back and muddy up the message to the world.
“I have made it clear that America will not base our entire foreign policy on reacting to terrorism,” he said. “In this effort, we do not act alone. Nor do we intend to send U.S. troops to occupy foreign lands.”
While the U.S., led by a president bent on carrying out an unproven strategy of multilateralism sits back waiting for regional powers to step up, the conditions on the ground continue to deteriorate.
“We will do everything to resist these advances,” Polat Tan, a senior commander with the Kurdish militia in Syria, which is defending Kobani told Fox News. “We will fight till every last drop of blood, but if help does not arrive soon, disaster is at hand.”
In Iraq, the situation is no less dire. After six weeks of American airstrikes, the Iraqi government’s forces have failed to break the Sunni Islamic extremists’ hold on more than a quarter of the country.
On Monday, more than 300 soldiers died after the loss of the base, Camp Saqlawiya. Ali Bedairi, a regional lawmaker from the governing alliance, confirmed the horrible events, noting a soldier’s testimony heard on video only because he was one of 200 who managed to escape said.
“They did not have any food, and they were starving for four days,” the soldier said. “We drank salty water; we could not even run.”
Sunni tribes eventually joined the fight after President George W. Bush boldly ordered the surge in Iraq in 2007, a component in-power politicians are too cowardly to admit. With the presence of U.S. fighters on the ground and committed, the Sunni tribes in Anbar and other regions drove al-Qaeda-linked terrorists from their home towns in what is now known as the Sunni Awakening. Now that President Obama has taken that option off the table, allies and would-be allies dimply do not trust the U.S., thus the military strategy is failing.
“The Sunni tribes’ role here is almost nonexistent,” said Ali al-Jabouri, a local fighter. “There are many tribes in the villages near here, but they were not serious about joining us to combat the Islamic State, and until now none of them have joined us.”
In the rare instances the Iraqi Army recaptures lost territory, they have been relinquishing control to the local Iraqi police. Then, the police are quickly defeated in preplanned advances by the Islamic State. These losses are predictable, but in the case of the Kurdish Peshmerga fighters, not preventable.
“We will fight till every last drop of blood, but if help does not arrive soon,” Tan said, “disaster is at hand.”
