The John Batchelor Show

VIDEO: Orlando Shooter was ISIS

June 21, 2016

Monday 20 June 2016 / Hour 1, Block A: Tom Joscelyn, Long War Journal senior editor & FDD,  and Bill Roggio, Long War Journal senior editor  & FDD, in re: The full Orlando transcript includes phrases connecting the shooter to al Baghdadi. Sounds  like ceremonial, cult-like statements of Islamic killers.
Early today,  FBI released a partial transcript, quoted Mateen during a 911 call:  “I pledge allegiance to  [omitted].”  How dumb can you get??  Then the FBI and DoJ jointly issues a less-cut-up version.  With Omar Mateen, a consistent cult mentality through his life.  ISIS wants jihadists to commit attacks and pledge bayah (allegiance) to Baghdadi jus before you die.  Mateen did this four times the night of the attack. The whole idea of IS is that the leader of the caliphate is the Top Guy.  At odds with how al Qaeda operates. 
Taliban and US drone strikes killed an emir – Taliban says the West has failed to understand the psychology of Taliban –p we long to die while fighting for our cause of Islam; Quran says here’s no greater honor.  Killing us won't take us to the negotiating table; you're giving us exactly what we want.   The US has done zilch to get them to negotiate. And why would they now??   Our best chance would have been when we had the most troops in-country.   They translate modern, robotic warfare into their own strength.
Monday 20 June 2016 / Hour 1, Block B: Tom Joscelyn, Long War Journal senior editor & FDD,  and Bill Roggio, Long War Journal senior editor  & FDD, in re:    Fifty-one members of State Dept wrote a letter proposing a change in course of US policy and strikes on Assad’s regime in Syria.  What would that accomplish”?  Assad, agree he’s evil, is the source of most of the deaths in Syria – but if the US bombed Assad to oblivion, what would happen? “Assad is the real cause of ISIS” – not.  ISIS is not monocausal and that’s a stupid analysis. The noti0n that removing one guy would solve it all is absurd.  A US mil action in Syria would immediately tangle with Russia; does State want actual hot war with Russia?  Don't ask a practical and realistic question which is not the purview of State bureaucracies. They're just frustrated.  Is State just trying to work with al Nusrah (= al Qaeda)?  Yup, some are.    Some high people in Washington foreign policy establishment want to collaborate with al Qaeda.  /  Iran:  ”We’ll fight in Iran and Syria till the last jihadi is killed” – i.e., Iran is in this for the long haul. Iranian resources? (The US just gave Teheran $150 billion.) Maybe have lost a thousand Iranian troops so far; recall that Iran and Iraq fought a bloody war for eight years and millions died.