The military campaign against ISIS terrorists in Iraq and Syria is proving successful so far, a US Central Command official said on Feb. 19. Current operations have severely hampered two of three “centers of gravity,” meaning ISIS can no longer operate as a “conventional, unconventional, and as a hybrid threat.” In addition, the organization’s “ability to govern is very, very limited. And, that is actually one of the tenets of what they want to be able to accomplish long-term,” said the official, who spoke on background via satellite to reporters at the Pentagon. In addition, ISIS is struggling to seize and hold additional terrain beyond what it has right now. “In fact, in Iraq, [ISIS is] losing ground every single day,” said the official, who acknowledged that that might seem like a contradiction considering recent reports that ISIS had gained control of al-Baghdadi in the western province of Anbar, placing them in close proximity to Al Asad Air Base. Operationally, ISIS is on the defense, said the official. “That does not mean that [ISIS] cannot conduct limited and/or isolated offensive operations,” the official added. “But, [it] is in a zero-sum game kind of environment. If [ISIS], for example, were to decide to put 1,000 new fighters back up into Khobani, that means [it] would not be doing something somewhere else … In total, our effects are outpacing [the organization’s] ability to regenerate, and I think that’s a critical point.” (Briefing transcript.)
Celebrating 100 Years of Liquid-Fueled Rockets
March 11, 2026
March 16, 2026, marks 100 years since Dr. Robert H. Goddard launched the world’s first liquid-fueled rocket. Over the past century, new and ever more capable liquid-fueled rockets have literally propelled humanity into space. Why liquid-fueled rockets?