Commando Raids on ISIS Yield Vital Data in Shadowy War<br />After months of waiting for an opportunity to seize Mr. Uzbeki without putting civilians at risk, one arose on April 6 for the so-called expeditionary<br />targeting force, a group of commandos from the secretive Joint Special Operations Command who hunt Islamic State leaders in Iraq and Syria.<br />The associate, Abdurakhmon Uzbeki, was a rare prize whom United States Special Operations forces had been tracking for months: a midlevel<br />but highly trusted operative skilled in raising money; spiriting insurgent leaders out of Raqqa, the Islamic State’s besieged capital in Syria; and plotting attacks against the West.<br />Cellphones and other material swept up by Special Operations forces proved valuable for future raids, though the missions fell short of their goal to capture,<br />not kill, terrorist leaders in order to obtain fresh, firsthand information about the inner circle and war council of the group, also known as ISIS.<br />In a similar raid in early January, American commandos killed another midlevel Islamic State leader they had been trying to capture<br />and interrogate in the eastern Syrian province of Deir al-Zour, which is largely under Islamic State control.<br />Mr. Uzbeki, a combat-hardened veteran of shadow wars in Syria<br />and Pakistan, died in the gun battle, thwarting the military’s hopes of extracting from him any information about Islamic State operations, leaders and strategy.
