ISIS used “sulphur mustard” against US troops in northern Iraq near Mosul on Tuesday, Marine Corps Gen. Joseph Dunford, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on Thursday. “None of our people were injured,” Dunford said. The weapon consisted of a shell filled with a “blistering mustard agent” but lacked “sophisticated means to deliver it.” The Defense Department said this is not the first time ISIS has fired mustard shells at US, Kurdish, and Iraqi troops, but that these attacks have produced only a “moderate level of concern.” On Sept. 12, US forces destroyed an ISIS chemical weapons factory set up in a converted pharmaceutical building.
The Pentagon has concluded a new agreement to buy laser-guidance kits that turn rockets into drone-killing weapons. BAE Systems and the Defense Department announced a framework deal of up to seven years for 25,000 Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System guidance kits annually for the U.S. military.