After confusion Thursday about whether all coalition strikes are included on Pentagon press releases about Operation Inherent Resolve, spokesman Army Col. Steve Warren clarified Friday that “if a bomb falls in Iraq or in Syria, it makes it to that press release.” However, he said, the Department of Defense does sometimes “consciously vague it up a little” because the US military does not want “the enemy to know what we know.” After the DOD announced the hit on an ISIS cash collection point, he noted, the group moved the rest of its cash. Warren also clarified that while a top ISIS leader known as Omar the Chechan was hit by a coalition airstrike, he may have survived. “There were 13 personnel when the bomb hit. We know that 12 of them are dead and one of them managed to limp away,” Warren said. “We’re looking into it.”
Three B-1B Lancers from the 7th Bomb Wing flew over the Indo-Pacific alongside F-16s from the Japanese Air Self Defense Force recently, as part of a joint large force exercise. The mission began and ended in the continental U.S., as the bombers flew 31 hours and landed Jan. 11.