Veteran Marine Corps General: U.S. in a ‘Stalemate’ with Islamic State Terrorists

The veteran general nominated to lead the Marine Corps characterized the U.S. campaign against Islamic State terrorists in Iraq and Syria as a “stalemate,” contradicting previous assertions from the Obama administration.

Fox News reported that, while undergoing questioning from Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John McCain (R., Ariz.), Lt. Gen. Robert Neller said of the U.S.-led air campaign against IS (also known as ISIL or ISIS) in the region, “I believe they are in a stalemate right now.”

Indeed, the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies concluded last week that the administration’s bomb campaign to scale back IS launched last year yielded no perceivable degradation of the terrorist organization’s forces. An unnamed defense official, who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, said that U.S. intelligence has “seen no meaningful degradation in their numbers.”

Syria crisis: warplanes spotted in Cyprus as tensions rise in Damascus

Signs of advanced readiness at likely hub of air campaign as UN inspection team comes under fire near site of alleged chemical attack

Warplanes and military transporters have begun arriving at Britain’s Akrotiri airbase on Cyprus, less than 100 miles from the Syrian coast, in a sign of increasing preparations for a military strike against the Assad regime in Syria.