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| Iraq |
| Obama: 'We Broke the ISIL Siege of Mount Sinjar' |
| 2014-08-15 |
[An Nahar] President Barack ObamaI inhaled. That was the point... declared Thursday that U.S. air strikes had broken the siege of an Iraqi mountain sheltering civilian refugees and that troops conducting reconnaissance there would be withdrawn. But he added that U.S. air strikes would continue against Lions of Islam from the so-called Islamic State or ISIL if they threaten U.S. personnel and facilities in the region, including the Kurdish regional capital Arbil. "The bottom line is -- the situation on the mountain has greatly improved and Americans should be very proud of our efforts because the skill and professionalism of our military and the generosity of our people we broke the ISIL siege of Mount Sinjar," Obama said in a statement to news hounds during his vacation in Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. "We helped save many innocent lives. Because of these efforts, we do not expect (there) to be an additional operation to evacuate people off the mountain and it's unlikely we're going to need to continue humanitarian air drops on the mountain," Obama said. Obama, a longtime skeptic of the use of U.S. force in Iraq, last week authorized air strikes as he warned that thousands of members of the Yazidi community risked genocide as they fled to the mountain under pursuit from ISIL Death Eaters. Obama said that the United States would still carry out air strikes along with stepping up military assistance to Iraqi government and Kurdish forces battling ISIL. "We will continue air strikes to protect our people and facilities in Iraq," said Obama, who had cited the risk to the U.S. consulate in Arbil as a reason for the military intervention. The Pentagon, meanwhile, said that there are still 4,000 to 5,000 Yazidi refugees sheltering on Mount Sinjar in northern Iraq. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #17 Nah, a 2-iron*. * And only G-d can 'use' a 2-iron. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2014-08-15 20:35 |
| #16 ...safely evacuated by assorted UN, Euro, + Local authorities. And a tall, skinny, unidentified black guy brandishing a 9 iron. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2014-08-15 19:58 |
| #15 At last check, the majority of the Yazidis on Sinajar have been safely evacuated by assorted UN, Euro, + Local authorities. |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2014-08-15 19:24 |
| #14 Took me a second; thought I had accidentally loaded Duffle Blog. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2014-08-15 18:38 |
| #13 Better yet: 'Pissing in the Wind' - they use our own weapons against us. BTW: the great Jerry Jeff Walker sang a song with that title. |
| Posted by: borgboy 2014-08-15 18:03 |
| #12 Wow, on one hand you have the EU, DoD, and every Achmed and Mahmoud in the ME talking about how ISIL has morphed into this war machine with thousands of men and tons and scads of captured US equipment. And on the other hand you have the empty suit saying that blowing up a couple of mortar positions and drone zapping a HumVee broke the siege. I would characterize the air effort by our forces in Iraq as pissing on a forest fire. |
| Posted by: Bill Clinton 2014-08-15 15:36 |
| #11 Wonder why he was not on the border during the crisis? He was hunting down ISIS leaders with just a bowie knife. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2014-08-15 14:25 |
| #10 The reason those dance pictures were pulled is because it was one of his many duplicates to confuse folks while he is on sniper missions and such doing the job the Navy Seals and others seem incapable of doing. In this case apparantly he had to resort to flying in some of the airstrikes himself to save the poor future democrats. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2014-08-15 14:24 |
| #9 No,no - fifteen holes in one. And that was before he had to break off after the ninth hole of the first round to go save all those people - personally. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2014-08-15 13:40 |
| #8 "I got a hole-in-one the other day too before noon!" No, no - fifteen holes in one. Not quite as good as North Korea's dearly departed Dear Leader, but close. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2014-08-15 11:43 |
| #7 What you mean "we"? Supply & support the Kurds properly to begin with, and Sinjar doesn't happen. |
| Posted by: OldSpook 2014-08-15 10:57 |
| #6 Did you break the siege when you were doing the twist Wednesday night at Martha's Vineyard? |
| Posted by: Raj 2014-08-15 09:23 |
| #5 The only surprise is that Obumble didn't say: "Just like when I was in Abbottabad and got Osama Bin Laden, I broke the siege of Mount Sinjar and I got all those people off the mountain and I saved them all single-handedly. I got a hole-in-one the other day too before noon!" (You didn't do any of that stuff you dipwad.) |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2014-08-15 08:59 |
| #4 Mission Accomplished |
| Posted by: Airandee 2014-08-15 06:33 |
| #3 |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2014-08-15 03:09 |
| #2 NYT: ISTANBUL — Yazidi leaders and emergency relief officials on Thursday strongly disputed American claims that the siege of Mount Sinjar in northern Iraq had been broken and that the crisis was effectively over, saying that tens of thousands of Yazidis remained on the mountain in desperate conditions. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2014-08-15 01:05 |
| #1 No you didn't. Just made it painful enough for them to stop attacking. Not the same thing. Fucking worthless shit. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2014-08-15 00:05 |