Delta has had a task force in Iraqi Kurdistan since at least last year with a mission of trying to find Islamic State leaders to kill or capture. During the war against the Islamic State’s predecessor organization, al Qaeda in Iraq, Delta and the other components of the military’s Joint Special Operations Command developed a system called “F3EAD” — for Find, Fix, Finish, Exploit, Analyze, Disseminate — in which strike forces would raid objectives such as militant safe houses not only to kill or capture the militants but to gain as much material of intelligence value as possible. By sucking information out of hard drives and cell phones, as well as quickly interrogating anyone taken prisoner, Delta and other JSOC forces were able to launch several missions a night, each based on intelligence gained in the previous raid. That dynamic could repeat itself here.
The successful raid into Syria ends what had been a dispiriting string of failed missions there. Last year, Delta Force commandos launched a raid in northern Syria in search of James Foley, an American reporter who was held hostage by the Islamic State. The group subsequently executed Foley. Last November, U.S. Special Operations forces carried out two raids in search of American photojournalist Luke Somers, who was executed by his captors as the elite forces swept into the compound where he’d been held alongside South African aid worker Pierre Korkie. Korkie was also killed.
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