The military works dutifully to keep tabs on American hostages taken captive in the Middle East, but rescue attempts rely on fluid intelligence and aren't always successful, retired U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely said Friday on "America’s Forum."
Vallely was speaking to the
Newsmax TV program about the unsuccessful rescue attempt of American hostage Luke Somers, a journalist who is being held by al-Qaida in Yemen.
"They're tracked very carefully and a lot of that information then will go to the Special Ops command and the Delta Force operators who usually go in to try to extract or save these individuals," Vallely said.
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"But it has to be based on very good intelligence and locations so they can get in there covertly and snatch that individual, bring them back, and in this case evidently the targeting
information wasn't quite correct."
Al-Qaida Arabian Peninsula is for all intents and purposes the same al-Qaida operating in other nations, Vallely said, noting that there’s "no delineation other than their names.
"They seem to take on different names and morph into something else depending on where they're at, but they're all connected ideology. They're Islamic radicals, they intend to associate and also expand the caliphate not only in North Africa, but they're attempting to do it in the Sinai, of course as well as up in Iraq, Iran, and that whole area.
"So they're on the move, they're on the offensive, and that's why we've got to be better at us being on the offensive, tracking them down, destroying them wherever they are."
Vallely said he does not think the United States is coordinating with Iran on any involvement in Iraq.
"I don't think so because the United States still tracks via satellite and other intelligence gathering operations in that area and they would know in that air space of any air coming in there, commercial or military, and they would be able to track it immediately and identify where those aircraft are coming from," he said.
"So we would have known any airspace violations or it could have had the tacit approval of some of the Iraqis."
The Iranians may be attempting to "continue to be the hegemonic power in the Middle East," he said.
The relationship between the U.S. and Israel "befuddles" Vallely, who said the White House has taken every opportunity to snub Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and directly oppose Israel’s policies regarding Iran.
Better, the general said, would be figuring out what reinforcement the U.S. can provide Israel "in case there is a launch by Iran ... [which has vowed to] destroy Israel and ensure Iran knows that anything they attempt to do, that the United States and Israel will come down on them very hard and they will absolutely put them in, our coalition over there, could put them in a serious situation that could destroy Iran as far as their government is concerned.
"If you don't put the fear of Allah in them or the fear of God somehow, they don't react to anything," Vallely said.
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