A crack unit has been formed to hunt down the terror chief whose barbaric Islamic State group has blazed a trail of murder and mayhem across the Middle East .
Around 100 CIA spooks and special forces are hunting for 42-year-old His Supreme Immensity, Caliph of the Faithful and Galactic Overlord, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi
...formerly merely the head of ISIL and a veteran of the Bagram jailhouse. Looks like a new messiah to bajillions of Moslems, like just another dead-eyed mass murder to the rest of us...
, dubbed The Ghost because he leaves no trace despite running an army of followers.
It is the biggest counter-terror search since the Americans tracked down and killed al-Qaeda criminal mastermind the late Osama bin Laden
... who is now sometimes referred to as
Mister Bones...
in 2011.
Using unmanned spy planes, other aircraft and satellite imagery, intelligence experts are gathering mobile phone call data and movements on the ground in Iraq and Syria .
A source said: "Al-Baghdadi is elusive but he will be found eventually.
"His forces are stretched so phone calls will be made — that will be his weak point."
Al-Baghdadi's 25,000-strong army
| ...much smaller than the 65,000 ISIS currently claims... |
Britannia is increasing the amount of help in the fight against the Islamic State.
Last week troops were flown to Kurdish capital Ibril on a secret mission to help refugees, which was later aborted.
And British spy planes are collecting intelligence on the movement of jihadists to be shared with Kurdish and Iraqi security forces and the US military.
Defence Secretary Michael Fallon hinted that British troops could be involved in combat.
He said: "We can't tell exactly how this is going to unfold. This is not simply a humanitarian mission."
| Good for Britain. |
David Cameron... has stated that he is
certainly a big Thatcher fan, but I don't know whether that makes me a Thatcherite,which means he's not. Since he is
not deeply ideologicalhe lacks core principles and is easily led. He has been described as
certainly not a Pitt, Elder or Younger,but he does wear a nice suit so maybe he's Beau Brummel ...
as Church leaders savaged him in a damning letter to Downing Street.
The Bishop of Leeds, the Rt Rev Nicholas Baines, slammed the "lack of coherent response" from Britannia to the spread of the Islamic State.
His letter — backed by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby — also attacked the PM's "silence" over helping Christians in Iraq.
| Everybody has been silent about the Plight of the Christians. Except France. Mr Hollande may be having difficulties with his domestic programmes, but he is traditionally French beyond his borders. |