Moron ISIS Militant Posts Selfie At His Headquarters, American Forces Use Picture To Find And Bomb It

A moron ISIS member just got himself and his entire headquarters blown up, and it’s all thanks to a selfie.

This week, U.S. Air Force intelligence shared a story about an ISIS militant who took a selfie at a headquarters in Syria. American intelligence forces also saw the selfie and used the picture’s data to locate the building and blow it up — all in less than 24 hours.

Air Force Gen. Hawk Carlisle, who leads Air Combat Command, told the story of the ISIS moron to Defense Tech.

“The guys that were working down out of Hurlburt, they’re combing through social media and they see some moron standing at this command. And in some social media, open forum, bragging about the command and control capabilities for Daesh, ISIL. And these guys go: ‘We got an in.’ So they do some work, long story short, about 22 hours later through that very building, three [Joint Direct Attack Munitions] take that entire building out.”

The bizarre incident making headlines this week is seen as important development for the United States against ISIS, the militant group that is normally very savvy on social media.

Unlike some of the older and more established terrorist groups in the Middle East, ISIS has embraced social media as a way to recruit new members and share its exploits. The groups have even produced slick, professionally taped and edited videos of beheadings and other executions that are then shared online.

The social media strategy has allowed ISIS to make inroads in the United States. A man killed this week by police, Usaamah Rahim, had reportedly been radicalized by ISIS online and was planning an attack on police officers when FBI and Boston police closed in.

CNN reported the following.

“Using social media as well as encrypted online communications beyond the reach of law enforcement surveillance, the terror organization is increasingly reaching new sympathizers and encouraging attacks such as the one foiled in Boston, officials said.

“‘The foreign terrorist now has direct access into the United States like never before,’ Michael Steinbach, assistant director of the FBI’s counterterrorism division, told the House Homeland Security Committee this week.”

There are some who believe the Air Force may have a bigger goal in sharing the story about the ISIS moron whose selfie ended up getting the headquarters blown up. There have been suggestions that the move was a bit of calculated propaganda to slam the militant group’s social media efforts and bring some good news for American efforts to fight ISIS in Iraq.

[Image via Getty Images / Gokhan Sahin]