{"id":125846,"date":"2014-06-23T17:55:45","date_gmt":"2014-06-23T17:55:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=125846"},"modified":"2014-06-23T23:56:40","modified_gmt":"2014-06-23T23:56:40","slug":"fell-deaf-ears-cia-mi6-knew-isis-assault-advance-failed-react","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/latest-news\/fell-deaf-ears-cia-mi6-knew-isis-assault-advance-failed-react\/","title":{"rendered":"It fell on deaf ears’: CIA and MI6 knew about ISIS assault in advance, failed to react"},"content":{"rendered":"

As Iraq\u2019s western border falls beyond the control of the country\u2019s government, a new report suggests the United States and Britain were warned of a burgeoning insurgency months before militants began gaining territory.<\/p>\n

According to a report by the UK-based Telegraph, senior Kurdish intelligence officials said they tried to explain to their allies in the CIA, MI6, and the central Iraqi government that the members of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) could represent a great threat to Iraq’s stability, but that those warnings failed to spark any action.<\/p>\n

In addition to calling attention to potential territorial gains in Iraq \u2014 a new Reuters report states the \u201centire Western frontier,\u201d comprising borders with Syria and Jordan, is now \u201cbeyond government control\u201d \u2014 Kurdish officials warned that ISIS is attracting foreign-born Muslims to its cause. Senior Kurdish intelligence officer Rooz Bahjat said that of the 4,000 estimated foreigners fighting alongside ISIS, somewhere between 400 and 450 were born in Britain and convinced to join the insurgency.<\/p>\n

These officials also said a formal alliance between ISIS members and ex-Baathists, who held power under Saddam Hussein, was nearly completed, and that it would lead to an attack on Mosul and other cities in northern Iraq.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe had this information then, and we passed it on to [the British] government and the US government,\u201d<\/em>Bahjat told the Telegraph.\u00a0“We knew exactly what strategy they were going to use, we knew the military planners. It fell on deaf ears.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Although ISIS has now quickly taken control of multiple cities in Iraq, it\u2019s believed that many Sunnis have decided to support the extremist organization over the lack of an inclusive government in central Iraq. Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki\u2019s Shia-led government has failed to bridge the country\u2019s sectarian divide, leaving many Sunnis feeling as if they have no stake in the country\u2019s future.<\/p>\n

As RT\u00a0reported<\/a>\u00a0previously, there have been indications that the US wants Maliki to resign his post so that attempts at Sunni\/Shia reconciliation could be made, but there is little evidence to suggest Maliki will go, and the US has not declared this preference publicly. Speaking on the situation last week, President Obama said,\u00a0“It\u2019s not our job to choose Iraq\u2019s leaders \u2026 But I don\u2019t think that there\u2019s any secret that, right now at least, there is deep division between Sunni, Shia and Kurdish leaders.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

During a recent interview with CBS News, Obama stated that ISIS is\u00a0\u201ca medium- and long-term threat\u201d<\/em>to US national security, but also cautioned that it is\u00a0\u201cjust one of a number of organizations that we have to stay focused on.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Speaking with the Telegraph in a separate article, head of Kurdish intelligence Lahur Talabani said it wasn\u2019t simply the 2003 invasion of Iraq that\u2019s responsible for today\u2019s violence, but that the lack of willingness on the part of Western powers to establish a peaceful government in the war\u2019s aftermath is primarily to blame. The Kurds have called for more substantial intervention from the West, to no avail so far.<\/p>\n

“I have completely lost hope in America after listening to President Barack Obama,”<\/em>\u00a0he said.\u00a0“I blame him personally for what has happened in Syria, in the Middle East, in Iraq at the moment. I have no hope any more.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

For his part, President Obama has ruled out the return of American troops to Iraq. Last week, he announced that 300 military advisers \u2014 in addition to 275 troops meant to safeguard the American embassy in Baghdad \u2014 would be sent to help train and support Iraqi troops. The US is reportedly mulling the use of airstrikes and drones at the request of Maliki\u2019s government, but has also expressed reluctance at entering a conflict with no clear political solution.<\/p>\n

Initially, the use of airstrikes was also ruled out due to the lack of good intelligence related to ISIS, something analyst Michael Stephens of the Royal United Services Institute think tank believes is the result of policies that placed significantly less emphasis on Iraq.<\/p>\n

\u201cBoth the Americans and the British had options to upgrade their presence on the ground many months before this happened but seem not to have acted on that,\u201d<\/em>\u00a0he said to the Telegraph.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor one reason or another there was a feeling that Iraq was not an important foreign posting and as a result it was seen as a place where careers go to die rather than a place to build a career. That meant the assets that should have been available to us weren\u2019t really there when this kicked off.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Reprinted<\/a> with permission<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As Iraq\u2019s western border falls beyond the control of the country\u2019s government, a new report suggests the United States and Britain were warned of a burgeoning insurgency months before militants began gaining territory. According to a report by the UK-based Telegraph, senior Kurdish intelligence officials said they tried to explain to their allies in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-125846","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-breaking-news","7":"category-latest-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125846\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}