Link post: Photo gallery from Ramadi Iraq. The city was destroyed in order to save it.

Satellite picture of bomb craters in Ramadi. AP/Digital Globe.

No time for a full post this morning, but I thought I would share this photo gallery with you. The Associated Press has an article about how Ramadi was almost completely destroyed during the fight against ISIS. Not only did that article have a very good photo gallery of the destruction, it also had a link to an interactive graphic showing the progress of the battle. The graphic includes sliders that show Ramadi the way it was before it was taken by ISIS and after it was liberated. 

The link to the AP article is here. 

The link to the AP graphic can be found here.

The destruction in the city is incredible and it is amazing to me how much damage was done while liberating it. It seems as though entire apartment complexes were destroyed. Dams were broken, buildings tumbled and bridges collapsed. In short, Ramadi is a broken city and I honestly don't know how Iraq is going to fix it. 

And the destruction does not bode well for the future. Mosul is a much bigger city then Ramadi was and ISIS will fight much harder for it then they did for Ramadi. The destruction there may be total by the time the battle is through. It may end up as bad as Aleppo in Syria... 

No matter what though, check out both of those links. If you can only choose one though, the graphic is much more visually impressive. There is even a map showing satellite views of the city that shows almost every crater and rubble pile...