In Syria, militias armed by the Pentagon fight those armed by the CIA

By: W.J. Hennigan, Brian Bennett and Nabih Bulos, latimes.com

Date: March 27, 2016

Excerpt:

Syrian militias armed by different parts of the U.S. war machine have begun to fight each other on the plains between the besieged city of Aleppo and the Turkish border, highlighting how little control U.S. intelligence officers and military planners have over the groups they have financed and trained in the bitter five-year-old civil war.

The fighting has intensified over the last two months, as CIA-armed units and Pentagon-armed ones have repeatedly shot at each other while maneuvering through contested territory on the northern outskirts of Aleppo, U.S. officials and rebel leaders have confirmed.

In mid-February, a CIA-armed militia called Fursan al Haq, or Knights of Righteousness, was run out of the town of Marea, about 20 miles north of Aleppo, by Pentagon-backed Syrian Democratic Forces moving in from Kurdish-controlled areas to the east.
NEWSLETTER: Get the day’s top headlines from Times Editor Davan Maharaj >>

“Any faction that attacks us, regardless from where it gets its support, we will fight it,” Maj. Fares Bayoush, a leader of Fursan al Haq, said in an interview.

http://www.latimes.com/world/middleeast/la-fg-cia-pentagon-isis-20160327-story.html

Subscribe for Updates

Please enter your name and email to receive periodic updates on new posts. I promise it won't be more than once a month at the most.

I will never give your email or information to anyone. Ever.