Leader of ISIS Branch in Afghanistan killed in Special Operations raid - Sensationalist Headlines

[QUOTE]The leader of the Islamic State affiliate in [URL="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/afghanistan/index.html?inline=nyt-geo"]Afghanistan[/URL] who orchestrated audacious attacks that further upended the country’s deteriorating security situation was killed in a special forces raid last month, the president of Afghanistan said in a statement on Sunday.The militant leader, Abdul Hasib, had overseen a number of bloody attacks that directly challenged the authority of President Ashraf Ghani, including a [URL="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/08/world/asia/kabul-military-hospital-in-afghanistan-comes-under-attack.html"]massacre at the main Afghan Army hospital[/URL] in Kabul that killed [URL="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/15/world/asia/afghan-hospital-attack.html"]at least 50 people[/URL]. Mr. Hasib was killed in [URL="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/27/us/politics/two-us-service-members-killed-in-afghanistan-pentagon-says.html"]an operation on April 27[/URL] in eastern Nangarhar Province, along the border with Pakistan, according to the statement by Mr. Ghani’s office. The statement said the government had waited for verification that Mr. Hasib had been killed in the raid before announcing his death. It did not say how his death had been confirmed. The United States military command in Afghanistan said in a statement on Sunday that American forces had participated in the raid that killed Mr. Hasib and up to 35 other militants. It was the second time in nine months that the leader of the Islamic State in the Khorasan, as the Afghanistan affiliate is known, was killed, Gen. John W. Nicholson, the commander of American forces in the country, said in the statement. Mr. Hasib’s predecessor, Hafiz Saeed Khan, [URL="https://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/13/world/asia/drone-isis-afghanistan-pakistan.html"]was killed in July[/URL] in a United States airstrike; he had been [URL="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/07/12/world/asia/us-strike-is-said-to-kill-senior-isis-militant-in-afghanistan.html"]reported dead a few times[/URL] before the American military confirmed it in August. The United States military command in Afghanistan had said that an operation on April 27 targeted Mr. Hasib. Two American Army Rangers, Sgt. Joshua Rodgers and Sgt. Cameron Thomas, were killed in the operation, [URL="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/28/world/middleeast/american-soldiers-afghanistan.html"]perhaps by so-called friendly fire[/URL], the Pentagon has said. Afghan and American forces often go on joint missions. The one that killed Mr. Hasib included about 50 United States Army Rangers and a similar number of Afghan special security forces, the Pentagon has said. A firefight broke out during the raid, which lasted over three hours, and American F-16 fighter jets and Apache attack helicopters carried out airstrikes to protect the troops. The Islamic State in the Khorasan, which uses an ancient name for the region that includes Afghanistan and Pakistan, expanded rapidly in the eastern part of Afghanistan, where government forces and an intense air campaign by the United States military have tried to rout the militants. They have been reduced to about 700 fighters, down from as many as 3,000, American officials said. [/QUOTE] [URL]https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/07/world/asia/abdul-hasib-isis-leader-killed.html[/URL]

Good riddance.

Good. You can say "Oh, well he's already been replaced by the next guy in line!" But there's a limited supply of people who are smart enough as well as having the proper skills and charisma, not to mention the zeal, to join up with ISIS and get to that level and succeed. Every one of these guys that gets smeared across a mountainside makes them a little bit dumber and slower. Regardless, I hope wherever this guy is now, that he's burning.

ISIS has always relied on an upper echelon command from qualified backgrounds to succeed against its local enemies. From former-republican guard commanders to veteran jihadis, the death of each and every ISIS commander will deal a tactical blow to the overall quality of their fighting, as said above. You can't just replace a high level ex-Iraqi commander or an ex-al qaeda fighter who's been in commission since the FIRST (Soviet) Afghanistan.

[QUOTE=evilweazel;52200490]there's a limited supply of people who are [b]smart[/b] enough as well as having the proper skills and charisma, not to mention the zeal, to join up with ISIS[/QUOTE] if you [i]voluntarily[/i] join fucking ISIS you're probably not too bright in the head to start with

[QUOTE=DudesonFan;52201632]if you [I]voluntarily[/I] join fucking ISIS you're probably not too bright in the head to start with[/QUOTE] People become terrorists for reasons other than being mentally impaired. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was a university scholar. Osama bin Laden had a degree in public administration and was radicalized in university. Ayman al-Zawahiri, the current "leader" of al-Qaeda also went to university, acquired degrees in medicine, served in the Egyptian army, and allegedly did work for the Red Crescent. The majority of high profile terrorist leaders and figures come from an intellectual background influenced by the extremist school of Islamic study and thought. Dumb people do not think about and study theology in-depth and come to these extreme conclusions. Yes, there are some (maybe many) illiterate and sheepish footsoldiers in IS probably not too bright, but many probably share similar backgrounds to their high profile brethren and simply fell victim to extremist ideology. Ideas are a powerful thing if you think what you're doing is justified for the greater good - extremist Islamic scholars, preachers, and leaders are professional victims just like their Western counterparts - they convince people that Islam is under attack by the West - that we, Americans and Europeans want to destroy the Middle East's way of life. Not that this is valid, but you can't exactly walk to Syria and sit down with these people to have a chat. When people are convinced that someone is trying to literally destroy their culture and understanding of the world that they've held since they were born, they will fight and do very, very bad things.

[QUOTE=DudesonFan;52201632]if you [i]voluntarily[/i] join fucking ISIS you're probably not too bright in the head to start with[/QUOTE] Smart and evil are nowhere near exclusive to one another. The despots and dictators of the world didn't get there through dumb luck, they were masters of manipulating peoples fears, emotions, or coercion and the like. It takes a bit of brain to get all that together and start something like ISIS and its branches. It's never a good idea to to go into any conflict assuming the other guy is dumb.