The leader of ISIS, the radical militant group barnstorming through Iraq, is a far more ruthless terrorist than even 9/11 mastermind Osama bin Laden, retired U.S. Army Lt. Col. Ralph Peters says.
"Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi [is] just a bloodthirsty monster,'' Peters told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.
"I certainly didn't like Osama bin Laden, but he had some ethics and principles within his perverted world view. Baghdadi is just a killer.''
Just how monstrous is al-Baghdadi?
"When they capture Iraqi officers, they saw off their heads, which is one of the reasons the Iraqi army is dissolving,'' said Peters, a best-selling author and strategic analyst at Fox News.
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The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, also known as ISIS, has already captured Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city, as well as Baiji and Tikrit, and is closing in on the Iraqi capital of Baghdad.
"They are killing civilians right and left … These ISIS guys under al-Baghdadi will kill everybody they need to kill and they will do it remorselessly and viciously and cruelly," Peters said.
"This has the potential to be the greatest disaster of the Obama presidency and that is saying something on top of Ukraine, Syria, the mess in Afghanistan …
"From Nigeria and Boko Haram all through Afghanistan to Pakistan and the Taliban's recent attack on the Karachi airport, the jihadis are on the attack across a vast section of the earth, and the United States is essentially doing nothing.''
Peters is author of the critically-acclaimed Civil War novel, "
Hell or Richmond,'' published by Forge.
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