Earlier this year, after the White House announced the start of military operations in Syria, the Obama Administration partially justified its actions by claiming a mysterious terrorist cell using the war-torn country for sanctuary posed an imminent threat to the US. But on Thursday, the Pentagon again downplayed the importance of the so-called Khorasan Group.
Lt. Gen. James Terry, the highest ranking officer overseeing attacks on the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, said at a press briefing that the mission, “Operation Inherent Resolve,” is not primarily concerned with Khorasan, a group unmentioned by US officials until September.
“My focus is Daesh,” he said, in response to a reporter’s question, referring to an Arabic name for Islamic State.
Terry declined to comment directly on the effect of prior attacks on Khorasan, claiming that public assessments of military operations cause extremist groups to “end up recreating themselves some place.” He also broadly stated that the US will continue “precision strikes” when it comes across “violent extremist organizations.” But, he reiterated, the mission is honed in on the Islamic State–specifically its infrastructure in Iraq.
“Again, my principle focus in Syria–while we are working Iraq first–is to make sure we shape that deeper fight out there in terms of sanctuary in some places–places like Raqqa–so it has an enduring effect in what we’re doing in Iraq,” Terry said.
It was the latest in a series of statements dialing down the importance initially placed on Khorasan Group by US officials, and the danger it supposedly poses to Americans from Syria. And it came over a week after CNN reported that a French man who allegedly makes hard-to-detect-bombs for the “al-Qaida affiliated” cell survived early November US airstrikes in Idlib that targeted him.
In its first iteration of public statements on the group in September, the administration struck a much more serious tenor. President Obama said that Khorasan consisted of “seasoned al-Qaeda operatives” who were “plotting against the United States.” Unnamed intelligence officials, through Yahoo News, said that the group was led by a man who had advance knowledge of the 9/11 attacks, and that it “had reached advanced stages” of a plot. One unnamed “senior official” accused Khorasan of “active plotting that posed an imminent threat to the US.”
Those claims quickly unraveled, however, shortly thereafter. As journalists Glenn Greenwald and Murtaza Hussein noted in The Intercept, follow-up reports that were markedly less dramatic. One stated there was “no credible information” about a Khorasan Group attack on the US, and that any attempt would be “limited in scope.” Another New York Times report called Khorasan plotting “aspirational.” The two writers detailed how major officials, including Pentagon spokesman Real Adm. John Kirby and FBI director James Comey, conceded that prior allegations about a timetable and an “imminent threat” were speculative. Greenwald and Hussein also pointed out that NBC News’ Richard Engel, a few days after reporting threats about plots to bring down airplanes, tweeted of “Syrian activists telling us theyve [sic] never heard of Khorasan or its leader.”
Whatever the case, Terry’s press conference Thursday shows that, for the US, the claims about Khorasan were merely a sideshow–that the Islamic State, or Daesh, was always the “primary target.” As Hussein and Greenwald put it, the allegations may have even amounted to “propagandistic and legal rationale for bombing yet another predominantly Muslim country.”
“While emotions over the ISIS beheading videos were high,” the duo wrote, “they were not enough to sustain a lengthy new war.”
