A top specialist in chemical weapons for the Islamic State who is in American custody in northern Iraq has given military interrogators detailed information that resulted in two allied airstrikes in the last week against the group’s illicit weapons sites, Defense Department officials said Wednesday.
The prisoner, an Iraqi identified by officials as Sleiman Daoud al-Afari, was captured a month ago by commandos with an elite American Special Operations force. He was described by three officials as a “significant operative” in the Islamic State’s chemical weapons program. Another official said he once worked for Saddam Hussein’s Military Industrialization Authority.
The Islamic State’s use of chemical weapons in Iraq and Syria has been known, but Mr. Afari’s capture has provided the United States with the opportunity to learn detailed information about the group’s secretive program, including where chemical agents were being stored and produced.
ISIS Using Poison Gas in SyriaAUG. 24, 2015
Under interrogation, Mr. Afari told his captors how the group had weaponized sulfur mustard and loaded it into artillery shells, the officials said. Based on information from Mr. Afari, the United States-led air campaign conducted one strike against a weapons production plant in Mosul, Iraq, and another against a “tactical unit” near Mosul that was believed to be related to the program, the officials said.
Pentagon officials refused to publicly acknowledge the capture and interrogation of Mr. Afari, saying that they did not want to reveal details of what the American Special Operations team is doing in Iraq. But, “We know they have used chemical weapons in both Iraq and Syria,” a Pentagon spokesman, Capt. Jeff Davis, said on Wednesday, referring to the Islamic State. “This is a group that does not observe international norms.”
Chemical warfare
agents, broadly condemned and banned by most nations under international convention, are indiscriminate. They are also difficult to defend against without specialized equipment, which many of the Islamic State’s foes in Iraq and Syria lack. The agents are worrisome as potential terrorist weapons, even though chlorine and blister agents are typically less lethal than bullets, shrapnel or explosives.
It was unclear how the Islamic State obtained sulfur mustard, a banned substance with a narrow chemical warfare application. Both the former government in Iraq of Saddam Hussein and the current government in Syria at one point possessed chemical warfare programs.
Mr. Afari was captured last month by a new Special Operations force made up primarily of Delta Force commandos shortly after they arrived in Iraq. They are the first major American combat force on the ground there since the United States pulled out of the country at the end of 2011
The military’s assertion that Mr. Afari was part of Saddam Hussein’s Baathist program in the 1980s is not ironclad, based on details released so far. Mr. Afari is believed to be about 50, which would mean he was in his teens or early 20s at the time.
Pentagon officials insist that the United States has no plans to hold Mr. Afari or any other prisoners for any length of time, and say that they will be handed over to Iraqi and Kurdish authorities after they have been interviewed. The officials say they do not intend to establish a long-term American facility to hold Islamic State prisoners, and Obama administration officials have ruled out sending any to the United States military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
Delta Force raid last May, when two dozen American commandos from Iraq entered eastern Syria aboard Black Hawk helicopters and V-22 Ospreys and killed Abu Sayyaf, described by American officials as the Islamic State’s emir for oil and gas. Abu Sayyaf’s wife, Umm Sayyaf, was captured and taken to a screening facility in northern Iraq, where she was questioned and detained. American forces seized laptops, cellphones and other materials from the site.
After being held for three months by the American authorities and providing them information, officials said, Umm Sayyaf was transferred in August to Kurdish custody.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/10/world/middleeast/isis-detainee-mustard-gas.html?_r=0
The prisoner, an Iraqi identified by officials as Sleiman Daoud al-Afari, was captured a month ago by commandos with an elite American Special Operations force. He was described by three officials as a “significant operative” in the Islamic State’s chemical weapons program. Another official said he once worked for Saddam Hussein’s Military Industrialization Authority.
The Islamic State’s use of chemical weapons in Iraq and Syria has been known, but Mr. Afari’s capture has provided the United States with the opportunity to learn detailed information about the group’s secretive program, including where chemical agents were being stored and produced.
ISIS Using Poison Gas in SyriaAUG. 24, 2015
Under interrogation, Mr. Afari told his captors how the group had weaponized sulfur mustard and loaded it into artillery shells, the officials said. Based on information from Mr. Afari, the United States-led air campaign conducted one strike against a weapons production plant in Mosul, Iraq, and another against a “tactical unit” near Mosul that was believed to be related to the program, the officials said.
Pentagon officials refused to publicly acknowledge the capture and interrogation of Mr. Afari, saying that they did not want to reveal details of what the American Special Operations team is doing in Iraq. But, “We know they have used chemical weapons in both Iraq and Syria,” a Pentagon spokesman, Capt. Jeff Davis, said on Wednesday, referring to the Islamic State. “This is a group that does not observe international norms.”
Chemical warfare
agents, broadly condemned and banned by most nations under international convention, are indiscriminate. They are also difficult to defend against without specialized equipment, which many of the Islamic State’s foes in Iraq and Syria lack. The agents are worrisome as potential terrorist weapons, even though chlorine and blister agents are typically less lethal than bullets, shrapnel or explosives.
It was unclear how the Islamic State obtained sulfur mustard, a banned substance with a narrow chemical warfare application. Both the former government in Iraq of Saddam Hussein and the current government in Syria at one point possessed chemical warfare programs.
Mr. Afari was captured last month by a new Special Operations force made up primarily of Delta Force commandos shortly after they arrived in Iraq. They are the first major American combat force on the ground there since the United States pulled out of the country at the end of 2011
The military’s assertion that Mr. Afari was part of Saddam Hussein’s Baathist program in the 1980s is not ironclad, based on details released so far. Mr. Afari is believed to be about 50, which would mean he was in his teens or early 20s at the time.
Pentagon officials insist that the United States has no plans to hold Mr. Afari or any other prisoners for any length of time, and say that they will be handed over to Iraqi and Kurdish authorities after they have been interviewed. The officials say they do not intend to establish a long-term American facility to hold Islamic State prisoners, and Obama administration officials have ruled out sending any to the United States military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.
Delta Force raid last May, when two dozen American commandos from Iraq entered eastern Syria aboard Black Hawk helicopters and V-22 Ospreys and killed Abu Sayyaf, described by American officials as the Islamic State’s emir for oil and gas. Abu Sayyaf’s wife, Umm Sayyaf, was captured and taken to a screening facility in northern Iraq, where she was questioned and detained. American forces seized laptops, cellphones and other materials from the site.
After being held for three months by the American authorities and providing them information, officials said, Umm Sayyaf was transferred in August to Kurdish custody.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/10/world/middleeast/isis-detainee-mustard-gas.html?_r=0