President Obama’s ISIS combat strategy involved training, equipping and mobilizing what the administration called “Syrian Moderates”.   The overall ‘strategy’ has been an abject failure as the U.S. has been unable to assemble more than a few handfuls of forces who are willing to engage in such a tenuous plan.  However, today the plan, as poor in concept as designed, suffered a remarkable set-back. 

BAGHDAD — The commander of a group of Syrian fighters trained by the United States has been kidnapped by Al Qaeda’s affiliate in Syria, his group said in a statement Thursday.

The commander, Nadeem Hassan, and seven of his fighters were taken by the Nusra Front, a rival of the Islamic State in Syria, as they were returning from a meeting in Turkey.

A contingent of 54 fighters from Mr. Hassan’s group, known as Division 30, are the only ones who have graduated from a Pentagon program to train Syrian rebels to fight the Islamic State in Syria. One the fighters taken with Mr. Hassan was his deputy, Farhan Al-Jasem, who commands the fighters who graduated from the American training program.

A number of other insurgents in Syria said that Mr. Hassan’s men had participated in the American program to train insurgents to fight the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL. Mr. Hassan’s description of details of the training program, including the timing, content, logistics and number of fighters who participated, matched what American officials have said publicly and privately about the Pentagon program.

The reported kidnapping is likely to be a new blow to the troubled American program, which in its first year has trained only about 60 fighters, according to an American official — all of them apparently from Mr. Hassan’s group. If it turns out that all seven of Mr. Hassan’s kidnapped comrades were trainees, then there will be only 47 fighters left in Syria from the Pentagon’s training program. (read more)