On March 26, 2025, authorities arrested multiple suspected ISIS members in a series of well-coordinated raids executed throughout the country.
Carried out in coordination with ground forces, the directorate conducted operations in al-Anbar, Kirkuk, and Nineveh, leading to the capture of seven suspected ISIS members, an official statement confirmed.
Security forces reportedly set up ambushes and raided militant hideouts, resulting in the arrests. The statement identified the suspects as individuals linked to previous attacks on Iraqi forces.
The detainees were transferred to the relevant authorities for legal proceedings.
ISIS in Iraq
The good news in this story is that Iraqi security forces, without the help of U.S. private military contractors, hit ISIS hard. The bad news is that the raid demonstrated that ISIS remains entrenched in the country.
ISIS is a Salafi-jihadist group with approximately 10,000 members that has conducted and inspired terrorist attacks worldwide, resulting in thousands killed or injured. In 2004, an Iraqi extremist network led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi merged with al-Qa‘ida to form ISIS’s predecessor group, al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), which Zarqawi led until his death in 2006. Now-deceased Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi took over the group in 2010 and began to expand its operations into eastern Syria in 2011. In 2013, AQI changed its name to ISIS, and in 2014, the group separated from al-Qaeda, declared itself a caliphate, and took over vast swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria.
Iraqi forces were caught off guard when, in 2014, ISIS swooped in and the terror group stopped just 30 miles from the Iraqi capital. The Iraqi government asked for aid, and coalition forces led by the United States stepped up. Soon, service members from around the world arrived to train Iraqi security forces, provide supplies and equipment, and provide air support that stopped ISIS.
As Iraqi forces gained more confidence, they began attacking ISIS and pushing the terror group back. Eventually, ISIS was forced out of all the territory it occupied in 2014.
In 2019, an international coalition ejected ISIS from its last stronghold in Syria, although the group continues to operate clandestinely there and in Iraq. Despite losing many of its leaders and its territory, ISIS remains capable of conducting insurgent operations in Iraq and Syria while overseeing at least nineteen branches and networks in Africa, Asia, and Europe.
That same year (2019), Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared victory over ISIS in Iraq. Army Col. Robert Manning, who’d heard such a pronouncement before, was a bit more subdued. “Iraqi security forces, to include the peshmerga, fought against a determined enemy and sacrificed greatly since 2014,” Manning said. “We congratulate all those who fought and remember all those who died to liberate Iraq from vicious ISIS territorial control.”
Contractors in Iraq
Private military contractors helped Iraqi security forces gain the confidence they needed to defeat ISIS, or at least mostly defeat ISIS. Contractors train government security forces and provide important logistical support.
Fighting insurgent militants is almost nothing like fighting a traditional army. Insurgents mostly focus on hit-and-run battles against unsuspecting targets. Anti-insurgency training, which contractors often handle, helps government security forces always be on the alert and helps them know what to do when attacked. So, instead of being caught off guard and getting scared, the government security forces are in control of the battle from the beginning.
Speaking of knowing what to do, a proper response usually includes support from a nearby firebase, in the form of smart missiles or other smart weapons. Contractors usually maintain these systems, mostly because contractors often worked at the companies that designed and/or built them.
Additionally, contractors give Washington deniability. Their numbers do not count in official numbers. In fact, DoD officials are often very quiet in this area, citing the need for security. So, many times, no one knows if support contractors are in country until they are injured or killed.
Injury Compensation Available
Another salient feature of anti-insurgency warfare is that there is no “front line” and “rear area.” All soldiers are equally at risk, regardless of their location. So, private military contractors risk injury whether they’re on patrol in an ISIS-controlled zone or turning screws in an airplane hanger.
A Defense Base Act lawyer can obtain compensation for medical bills following a deployment-related injury or illness. These bills include:
- Transportation Expenses: The medical facilities at many overseas military bases are little more than first-aid stations. Serious injury victims require immediate air transportation to another, larger facility. This air transportation could easily cost $20,000, even for a short, in-country flight.
- Emergency Treatment: The treatment delay usually means that injured contractors are in very bad shape by the time they arrive at fully equipped medical facilities. As a result, emergency care must be much more aggressive and is therefore much more expensive.
- Follow-Up Care: Some deployment-related injuries, most of them in fact, require ongoing care and maintenance. If complications arise, and they often do, routine checkups become emergency treatments. On a related note, Defense Base Act benefits also cover medical devices and other ancillary items.
- Physical Therapy: Usually, DBA medical benefits until victims reach MMI (maximum medical improvement) during physical therapy. At that point, if their residual function isn’t sufficient to allow full-time, continuous employment, long-term disability benefits are usually available.
Deployment-related injuries include trauma injuries, like gunshot wounds, and occupational diseases, like toxic exposure lung disease.
For more information about DBA procedure, contact Barnett, Lerner, Karsen, Frankel & Castro, P.A.