Islamic State: Up to $800m of funds 'destroyed by strikes'

 to $800m (£550m) in cash held by so-called Islamic State
(IS) has been destroyed in air strikes, a US military official
says.
Maj Gen Peter Gersten, who is based in Baghdad, said the US
had repeatedly targeted stores of the group's funds.
The blow to the group's financing has contributed to a 90%
jump in defections and a drop in new arrivals, he said.
In 2014, the US Treasury called IS "the best-funded terrorist
organisation" it had encountered.
How is Islamic State funded?
Islamic State's struggle to stay rich
In a briefing to reporters , Maj Gen Gersten, the deputy
commander for operations and intelligence for the US-led
operation against IS, said under 20 air strikes targeting the
group's stores of money had been conducted.
He did not specify how the US knew how much money had
been destroyed.
In one case, he said, an estimated $150m was destroyed at a
house in Mosul, Iraq.
Forces fighting IS received intelligence indicating in which
room of the house money was stored. The room was then
bombed from the air, Maj Gen Gersten said.
While it was difficult to know precisely how much money had
been destroyed in total, estimates put the figure at between
$500m and $800m, he said.
Islamic State's exact wealth is not known, but, after seizing oil
fields and setting taxes, it approved a budget of $2bn and
predicted a $250m surplus last year.
Since then, however, the group has lost territory, and its
oilfields have been targeted in air strikes by the US-led
coalition.
'Posing as women'
US intelligence indicated the group's cash troubles had led it
to start selling vehicles to make money, Gen Gersten said. In
January, the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights
reported that IS announced it was to cut fighters' salaries in
half "because of the exceptional circumstances that the
Islamic State is passing through".
"We're seeing a fracture in their morale, we're seeing their
inability to pay, we're seeing the inability to fight, we're
watching them try to leave Daesh in every single way," Gen
Gersten added, using an Arabic term for IS.
Some defectors had been captured posing as women or as
refugees in Iraq, he said.
The number of those arriving to fight for Islamic State in Iraq
and Syria had fallen to about 200 a month, Gen Gersten said,
down from a peak of between 1,500 and 2,000 per month a
year ago.
IS defectors: Three stories
In February, the White House said it believed there were some
25,000 people fighting for IS , down from close to 31,500 last
year.
Turkey has come under repeated pressure by the United
States to tighten its border with Syria and prevent people
crossing into IS-held territory.
On Tuesday, the US confirmed it would place rocket launchers
in Turkey close to the border of territory held by the group.
Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told Haberturk
newspaper the system would be deployed near the Syrian town
of Manbij, through where IS brings in new supplies and
fighters.