© Reuters/Axel Heimken
They were intended to help government forces in the west of Iraq, but instead the blunder ended up aiding the enemy.
The mistake was confirmed by two Iraqi officials, who said the airdrop of food, water and ammunition was meant to take place in Anbar province. However,
the inexperienced pilot got his bearings a little mixed up and unloaded the cargo in the wrong place, according to NBC News.
"Those soldiers were in deadly need of these supplies," said Hakim al-Zamili, an Iraqi MP. However they ended up benefitting the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS or ISIL) because of the "
wrong plans of the commanders in the Iraqi army and lack of experience" among the Iraqi pilots.
A brigadier in the Iraqi army, who did not want to be named, said that the incident took place on September 19 and also bemoaned the lack of flight time and combat skills of some of the pilots in the air force.
They "do not have enough experience ... they are all young and new," the brigadier said.
Meanwhile in Syria in late September, US-led coalition airstrikes
destroyed grain silos and other targets in parts of northern and eastern Syria dominated by the IS,
killing civilians while only wounding ISIS fighters, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Comment: So convenient for the government, alleged terrorist threats ramp the fear level, and have people grateful that they are losing their freedom. In fact, just too convenient. Orwellian indeed.
We always wonder about people who subscribe to the meme " if you've done nothing wrong, you have nothing to fear". If privacy matters so little to these people, do these same people have curtains in their windows? After all if you've done nothing wrong, why not let everybody look into your house? Or does privacy matter after all?