Brett McGurk (C), Kurdistan Region President Masoud Barzani (R). Source: https://twitter.com/brett_mcgurk
Almost 2,000 Kurdish Peshmerga fighters and 10,000 Iraqi forces troops have been killed during the campaign against ISIS, Brett McGurk, Special Presidential Envoy for the US-led coalition against ISIS, said during a press conference in the city of Erbil in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region on Thursday.
“The Peshmerga have suffered almost 2,000 martyrs in this overall campaign, and the Iraqi forces have probably suffered five times more. So if you put that into context, this has really been a very extensive campaign against Daesh [ISIS]. It has now lasted almost three years,” McGurk said.
The US presidential envoy added that “political disagreements” should not impact future battles against ISIS in Iraq. McGurk emphaseized that “it is very important that we remain united and focused on the effort to defeat Daesh and ensure they have a lasting defeat. And this war against Daesh is not over. They are still in Hawija, just south of here. And those operations will be starting very soon. And we have to make sure that we all remain focused on this very serious threat.”
The statement came amid the continued political turmoil in Iraq. The Kurdistan Regional Government is seeking to turn the autonomous region into an indepednent state and to include additional non-Kurdish oil-rich areas into it. The both ideas face a strong resistance from the Iraqi government as well as other local power brokers.
I sure hope the Kurds can get a home of their own without further bloodshed.
fuk the kurds, they are greedy whores
Syria is a bastion of secular ideals. The Kurds must not be allowed to ethnically cleanse where they are in a majority in the style of Israel.
I like the Kurds I’ve met myself , but at this point in time , a home of their own is a death sentence . Turkey , Iran , Iraq , and Syria are not about to be partitioned so that the US has a “new” base in the middle of them .
Syrian Kurds are less than 10% of Syrian population but they are a large ethnic population in Turkey, and another biggest ethnic minority population in Iraq and Iran. Still trying to see hem as a minority group the largest group since the Diaspora is the Ethnic Germans and they have no homeland they can return to they are twice the size of the Kurds, maybe even triple.
Diaspora of jews? How many ethnic germans were thrown out? And they were able to live in germany.
The were many that didn’t get to move to Germany even millions died as they were being expelled after WW2. The number of Jews in Germany in 1938 were 210,000 in 1933 it was 510,000 some had left to their new world of Israel and others left for greener pastures of North America. They continue the exodus still to this day as they leave Europe.
Thanks terracotta.many forget that over one and a half million christians were kicked out of post ottoman turkey in 1922 1923 and in 1938 from alexandretta to syria. Turkey to this day has almost no christians .exception may be a few cryptochristians .there are a few who have come out and openly reconverted to christianity in last few years.
The Kurds will get to live in Syria peacefully! If they attempt to create a Kurdish state (the same as isis wanting to make an islamic state) then Syria fought for nothing! Both win if they destroy isis and both live in Syria peacefully as they always did!
But if u balkanise the nation (which is a US and Israeli ambition to create bases near to Iran) then that does not create peace, it creates ww3! Turkey won’t go for it, Ira, won’t, Syria won’t, Iraq won’t! Russia won’t either because its already being contained by missile defence shields in Eastern Europe and in South Korea, Afghanistan and Japan!
If you want the Kurds to live in peace, give them medals and aid for fighting isis and let them live in Syria in peace! Enough of this North Vietnam, south Vietnam, North Korea, South Korea, east Germany, west Germany! ENOUGH!
I completely disagree with a Kurdish state! It means ww3!
the yankees and the new world disorder are responsibled for all these deaths – such hypocrisy – pay back in perm hell for these zio losers
Fact: America discovered other people are willing to die for her own interests.Nontheless, In Syria both would loose, Russia, Iran, Iraq and Turkey would not accept an independent Kurdistan. The US believed it could bully other nations into accepting an impossible event.Sad. The Kurds would end up with an quasi-autonomous state, slightly more rights than before, Syria dropping the name ”Arab”, but the country would be centrally governed with Assad as president.Assad would be re-elected as president until he dies in office.Americans and the Kurds would return all that land they fought to grab to the central government after the peace settlement.And the best thing is America would get zero land possession and zero national influence in Syria.The kurds would on the other hand obtain token advantages.All in all they died for nothing.Bunch of stupid men and women.Netan Yahoo must be laughing.
But this is part of the US Forever War scheme. No matter how disastrous this turns out, the US will always find an excuse (legal or not) to occupy bases in Syria and Iraq. It really doesn’t matter who is fighting whom or what the outcome. ‘Fighting ISIS’ as an excuse by itself is good for another decade of presence. The only thing the US has to do is change the name of ISIS every couple of years, but they’ll still be the same Saudi Wahhabists.
The US doesn’t give a damn about the Kurds or anyone else in Syria and Iraq. The US is there to further the interests of Israel and Saudi Arabia against Iran – until the US finally starts the war with Iran. That will be another leg of the US Forever War.
The are doing well with the forever war in afghan I believe. We will never leave until the empire falls. Simple fact. Same with all other conquered people, our bases in Germany, japan and korea will never cease to exist as long as US is a country.
Brilliant Pave way. You have captured whole modus operandi of zio usa in a paragraph or two!
PHESMERGA DID NOT EVEN FIGHT ISIL AT ALL ONLY IN THIER FEW PLACES LIKE SINJAR . MOST OF THE FIGHT IS DONE BY IRAQI FORCE AND PMU. PESMERGRA WAS ONLY GRABIG LAND AND RESOURCE FROM IRAQI FORCE WHILW IRAQI FORCE ARE BUSY FIGHTING DAESH .
Thats true.just syro kurda helped yezidi.barzanis turco iraqo kurds just sat on their fat well paid asses.after all why bother about some ” heretics” when we are doing well sellibg iraqi crude to the Turk foe our own pockets?
Foolish USA why don’t their say our moderate ISIS which we evacuated last week have killed 10 000 Iraqi soldiers and 2000 Kurdish our puppets in our secret traps.USA should also be clear that their fake friendly fire’s has contributed a lot of death.
Dont you just love how these zioyankees just invite themselves in . I know iraq government is a puppet of ziousa but it still bothers me .afterall, at least on paper de jure this part of iraq is still part of Iraq!