US drops bombs not just on Daesh, but on its cash, too

With sanctions, blacklists and other measures doing little to financially break the Islamic State, the United States has turned to a far simpler tactic to empty the group’s coffers: It is literally blowing them up.

American warplanes have struck nine depots where the group is believed to have stashed tens of millions of dollars in cash, said Col. Steven H. Warren, a spokesman for the American-led coalition. The strikes began in the summer and the latest came Monday in Mosul, Iraq, he said, showing a video in which plumes of cash could be seen fluttering about in the moments after a building was demolished by a bomb, The New York Times reported on Thursday.

Colonel Warren, who spoke via video teleconference from Baghdad, could not say how much money had been destroyed in Mosul — “tens of millions of dollars” was the estimate offered — or whether the bills were Iraqi dinars, American dollars or some other currency. But he did offer up a catch phrase for the tactic: “Strike the Daesh cash, as we call it around here.”

Daesh, the Arabic name by which many in the Middle East derisively refer to the Islamic State, may not actually rhyme with cash (its pronunciation is closer to “da-ish” than “dash”). But the military appears confident that bombing cash depots is helping to sap the financial strength of the Islamic State, which American officials and experts believe may be bringing in around $1.5 billion to $2 billion a year.

“Striking these cash collection points hurts this enemy,” Colonel Warren said. “They operate on cash, right? There is no credit in” the Islamic State.

Source: MENA