Who Needs High-Tech Weapons? Angry Pigs Kill 3 ISIS Fighters
Policy + Politics

Who Needs High-Tech Weapons? Angry Pigs Kill 3 ISIS Fighters

Neil Hall

America’s new aircraft carrier the USS Gerald Ford cost $13 billion. The lowest-cost version to date of the F-35 Lightning II, a next-generation stealth fighter, has a price tag of about $95 million. Each Tomahawk missile that lit up the skies of Syria blew through $1.6 million. And the sniper rifle that the Marines covet costs $3,000.

But there are cheaper ways to take out an enemy. Like really angry pigs.

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The Times of London reports that three members of ISIS setting up an ambush were mauled to death by a pack of wild boar in a field about 55 miles southwest of Kirkuk in northern Iraq.

A local tribal leader said the pigs, which inhabit the dense reeds where ISIS terrorists were readying an attack on anti-ISIS villagers, were likely angered by the activity in their territory.

Besides the three jihadists mauled to death, five others were said to have been wounded.

Related: Here's What Firing 59 Tomahawk Missiles at Syria's Airfield Cost

It was not clear which subspecies of wild swine was involved in the attack, but the Carpathian boar is native to northern Iran, which is close to the region where the attack occurred.

The Carpathian is especially large and can weigh as much as 400 pounds. The boars are notoriously short-tempered and attack using their tusks as weapons.

It also was not clear how many hoofed killers were involved in the mayhem, but wild boar live in groups called sounders. Usually there are about 20 to a sounder, but there can be as many as 50.

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As the U.S. military buildup calls for ever-more-expensive weapons, maybe there is a lesson here. Instead of massive and costly machines laden with electronics, how about battalions of boars, companies of killer bees or platoons of “caliph-hating” Rottweilers?

Now that would be very special ops.

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