Officials described it as the kind of security emergency that could have upended the Middle East—and possibly global stability—overnight. According to Fox News, in northern Syria, nearly 6,000 hardened ISIS militants were locked inside detention centers guarded by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). As conflict spread through the region, U.S. intelligence agencies warned that the fragile prison system could collapse at any moment.
One senior American intelligence official told Fox News Digital, “If these 6,000 or so got out and returned to the battlefield, that would basically be the instant reconstitution of ISIS.” The official recounted, in detail, the secret operation that extracted the detainees from Syria and handed them over to Iraqi custody. The undertaking involved coordinated intelligence, hurried diplomacy, and a significant military airlift, all executed within weeks.
The warning signs had been visible for months, the official explained. In late October, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard concluded that Syria’s political transition was teetering toward chaos. Her office feared that instability could lead to a catastrophic breakout from overcrowded prisons. Acting quickly, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence—known as ODNI—dispatched a senior emissary to work with both the SDF and Iraqi officials to prepare emergency transfer plans before events spiraled beyond control.
By early January, escalating battles in Aleppo and surrounding provinces intensified the urgency. The intelligence official said it was recognized that it was a “severe crisis situation,” explaining that daily interagency coordination calls were established to manage the growing threat. Secretary of State Marco Rubio oversaw daily policy direction, while ODNI managed an operational working group connecting CENTCOM commanders, U.S. diplomats, and intelligence analysts—all focused on preventing thousands of radical fighters from melting back into the battlefield.
Iraq moved swiftly once briefed on the American assessment. Baghdad had its own reasons for urgency: leaders there feared that a mass escape could push the country back to the nightmare of 2014, when ISIS once again threatened its border. The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad helped pave the way diplomatically, ensuring that every logistical and political obstacle to the upcoming transfers was handled in advance.
CENTCOM then launched the physical extraction. Helicopters, transport aircraft, and manpower were surged into position to move the prisoners under tight security. “Thanks to the efforts… moving in helicopters, moving in more resources, and then just logistically making this happen, we were able to get these nearly 6000 out in the course of just a few weeks,” the official explained. The timing had been critical; the SDF was already stretched thin amid renewed fighting, raising fears that even a single breach could trigger a full-scale breakout.
Once in Iraq, the detainees were placed under secure control at a facility near Baghdad International Airport. The next stage focused on verification and documentation. FBI teams arrived to perform biometric identification, ensuring every inmate was properly cataloged. At the same time, the State Department began contacting the home countries of foreign ISIS members, urging them to take responsibility for their nationals. “”State Department is doing outreach right now and encouraging all these different countries to come and pick up their fighters,” the official said.
The transfer operation excluded families of ISIS fighters—thousands of women and children still in camps like al-Hol. According to Fox News, “the fate of the families has long been viewed by counterterrorism officials as one of the most complicated, unresolved elements of the ISIS detention system. Many of the children have grown up in camps after ISIS lost territorial control, and some are now approaching fighting age, raising fears about future radicalization and recruitment.”
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