Pentagon budgeterar för ökade strider mot IS

The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "The Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the U.S. Department of Defense. The Pentagon was designed by American architect George Bergstrom (1876–1955), and built by general contractor John McShain of Philadelphia. Ground was broken for construction on September 11, 1941, and the building was dedicated on January 15, 1943. General Brehon Somervell provided the major motive power behind the project; Colonel Leslie Groves was responsible for overseeing the project for the U.S. Army. The Pentagon is a large office building, with about 6,500,000 sq ft (600,000 m2), of which 3,700,000 sq ft (340,000 m2) are used as offices. Approximately 23,000 military and civilian employees and about 3,000 non-defense support personnel work in the Pentagon. It has five sides, five floors above ground, two basement levels, and five ring corridors per floor with a total of 17.5 mi (28.2 km) of corridors. The Pentagon includes a five-acre (20,000 m2) central plaza, which is shaped like a pentagon and informally known as "ground zero," a nickname originating during the Cold War on the presumption that it would be targeted by the Soviet Union at the outbreak of nuclear war. On September 11, 2001, exactly 60 years after the building's construction began, American Airlines Flight 77 was hijacked and flown into the western side of the building, killing 189 people (59 victims and the five perpetrators on board the airliner, as well as 125 victims in the building). It was the first significant foreign attack on Washington, D.C.'s governmental facilities since the burning of Washington during the War of 1812.

Islamiska staten (i Irak och Syrien/Levanten), förkortat IS, Isis eller Isil (arabiska: الدولة الإسلامية ad-Dawla al-Islamiyya (fi al-Iraq wa al-Sham) (Daish eller Daesh)), är en väpnad salafijihadistisk terrororganisation främst aktiv i Irak och Syrien. De betraktar sig som den legitima regeringen i en islamisk stat. I juni 2014 utropade gruppen ett världsvitt kalifat med religionpolitisk auktoritet över alla muslimer. Sedan dess refererar gruppen till sig själva enbart som ad-Dawla al-Islamiyya (Islamiska staten). Den beräknades av CIA hösten 2014 ha 31 000 stridande i Irak och Syrien. IS är känd för sin extrema tolkning av sharialagar vad gäller dem som inte delar deras tro och för sina militära attacker på civila, tortyr, avrättningar av män och bortrövanden och avrättningar av kvinnor. FN:s barnrättskommité har fördömt deras systematiska torterande och dödande av barn. Bland de etniska och religiösa grupper som utsatts för övergrepp finns assyrier/syrianer, druser, kristna, kurder, mandeer, shabaker, shiamuslimer, turkmener och yazidier. Även traditionella sunnimuslimer, inklusive utövare av sufism, som motsatt sig IS härjningar har drabbats av vedergällningsattacker. I Irak märker ISIS dörrar till kristnas bostäder med ett 'N' (för 'nasarin', en lokal term för kristna) och förseglar dörrarna, samt hotar med avrättning om personerna inte omvänder sig och betalar skatt till ISIS. IS snabba tillväxt anses vara en följd av dess ledare, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, av finansiering från Saudiarabien samt välbärgade donatörer från diverse Gulfstater, framgångsrik rekrytering på sociala medier (även från Västeuropa och USA) samt av samarbete med andra sunnitiska grupper under syriska inbördeskriget. Ekonomisk och politisk diskriminering mot sunnimuslimer i Irak (där sunniter tidigare utgjorde en dominerande minoritet till invasionen 2003) och Syrien (där sunniter utgör en stor majoritet) och dessa länders shiitiskt dominerade regeringar har också bidragit till gruppens stöd.

The military budget is the portion of the discretionary United States federal budget allocated to the Department of Defense, or more broadly, the portion of the budget that goes to any military-related expenditures. This military budget pays the salaries, training, and health care of uniformed and civilian personnel, maintains arms, equipment and facilities, funds operations, and develops and buys new equipment. The budget funds all branches of the U.S. military: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, and Coast Guard. For the period 2010-14, SIPRI found that the United States was the world's biggest exporter of major arms, accounting for 31 percent of global shares, followed by Russia with 27 percent. The USA delivered weapons to at least 94 recipients. The United States was also the world's eighth largest importer of major military equipment for the same period. The main imports were 19 transport aircraft from Italy; and equipment produced in the US under licence–including 252 trainer aircraft of Swiss design, 223 light helicopters of German design and 10 maritime patrol aircraft of Spanish design.