Washington, D.C. (The Adobo Chronicles) – The United States launched an airstrike Friday against Islamic militants in northern Iraq, just hours after President Barack Obama authorized military action against this same country that was invaded by George W. Bush in 2003.

The Pentagon said two FA-18 fighter-attack planes dropped 500-pound, laser-guided munitions on a mobile artillery place near Irbil, the capital of the Kurdish region.The jets came from the USS George H.W. Bush, an aircraft carrier operating in the Persian Gulf, according to a Defense Department official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military details.

Speaking to reporters minutes after the airstrike, Obama said the goal of today’s action was “to disarm Iraq of weapons of mass destruction and to free the Iraqi people,” using the exact same words by George W. Bush after the U.S. launched the now infamous “shock and awe” in Baghdad eleven years ago.

On October 21, 2011,  Obama announced that all US troops and trainers would leave Iraq by the end of the year, bringing the US mission in Iraq to an end. On December 15, 2011, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta officially declared the Iraq War over, at a flag lowering ceremony in Baghdad.

“The U.S. has been having withdrawal symptoms since we officially ended the Iraq War three years ago,” Obama said.”We needed something that will keep our troops busy, so we decided to look for weapons of mass destruction which may have been hidden by the late Saddam Hussein in the mountains of Irbil. Besides, we need to keep up with our reputation as world police.”

When asked by a White House reporter what makes him think that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction, Obama replied, “We saw credible evidence of WMDs using Google Maps which we then confirmed when we switched to satellite view using Google Earth.”