Officials at United States Central Command are being investigated by the Pentagon’s inspector general for allegedly downplaying the expansion of ISIS by altering intelligence reports.
According to the New York Times, a whistleblower within the Defense Intelligence Agency told Pentagon officials he had obtained evidence showing Centcom had altered “the conclusions of intelligence assessments prepared for policy makers, including President Obama.”
“The prospect of skewed intelligence raises new questions about the direction of the government’s war with the Islamic State, and could help explain why pronouncements about the progress of the campaign have varied widely,” the Times notes.
Although it’s purported the president was possibly fed false intelligence, the Obama administration’s actions in the fight against ISIS point to both direct and indirect support of the terrorist group.
Just last May, a declassified government document obtained by the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch revealed the Pentagon both predicted and allowed the rise of the Islamic State.
“[T]he Pentagon foresaw the likely rise of the ‘Islamic State’ as a direct consequence of this strategy, and warned that it could destabilize Iraq,” journalist Nafeez Ahmed wrote. “Despite anticipating that Western, Gulf state and Turkish support for the ‘Syrian opposition’ — which included al-Qaeda in Iraq — could lead to the emergence of an ‘Islamic State’ in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the document provides no indication of any decision to reverse the policy of support to the Syrian rebels. On the contrary, the emergence of an al-Qaeda affiliated ‘Salafist Principality’ as a result is described as a strategic opportunity to isolate Assad.”
Several months after the document surfaced, former Defense Intelligence Agency Director Michael Flynn admitted during an interview with Al Jazeera that the Obama administration had made a “willful decision” to support terrorist groups in the region.
“I think it was a decision… a willful decision,” Flynn said, noting his disagreement with the policy.
Military personnel similarly decried President Obama’s transparent support for radical jihadists in 2013 by posting photos of themselves holding protest signs to social media.
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