Secret documents obtained from freedom of information requests have revealed that the United States army predicted the rise of the Islamic State militant group even before it started making headlines around the globe.
According to News.com.au, over a 100 pages of classified reports from the Department of Defence and the State Department obtained by conservative watchdog Judicial Watch provides a slightly different picture as compared to what the Obama administration had previously portrayed to the public.
The documents show an August 2012 report containing military intel that predicted the rise of the Islamic State in the wake of regime change in Syria.
The document outlined the "dire consequences on the Iraqi situation," and potential opportunity for the terrorist group, which grew out of Al-Qaeda in Iraq."
The Islamic State’s capture of the Iraqi city of Ramadi has sparked renewed criticism of the US government’s decision to virtually withdraw all its troops in 2011 from the region and its current anti-ISIS strategy.
The fall Sunday of Ramadi, just 70 miles from Baghdad, marks the second time in roughly a year that the extremist group has taken control of a major Iraqi city -- after the United States spent nearly eight years at war in the country.
Image: An Iraqi Sunni displaced woman, who fled the violence in the city of Ramadi carries her child on the outskirts of Baghdad, Iraq. Photograph: Reuters
