While it’s nothing new that a Russian military intelligence unit could complete a comprehensive study of a Syrian airstrip, it is novel that a supporter of the self-declared Islamic State could use open-source information to perform this type of analysis full time. They could now purchase satellite images to track similar scenarios and to inform grand strategy and prioritize targets. A radical jihadist version of Elliott Higgins, the British citizen journalist who has exposed Russian actions in Ukraine and Syria using open-source intelligence, would be a prized asset for any extremist group.
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