ISIS Brain Trust: A Look Inside Terror Lab in Syria

ISIS brain trust is conducting sophisticated research on conventional and unconventional weapons, including surface-to-air missiles and chemical agents, inside their stronghold in Raqqa, Syria, according to current and former U.S. intelligence officials.

Video shot at an ISIS training facility and obtained by Britain's Sky News seems to show that these scientists and experts, who include Saddam Hussein loyalists and Syrian military defectors, may have figured out how to use remote-controlled cars as driverless bombs, and how to repair thousands of heat-seeking missiles that can down jet fighters and passenger planes, NBC News reported. 

U.S. officials would neither confirm nor deny the battery research, but they say intelligence agencies have long been tracking the ISIS' weapons programs.

The video also shows that ISIS is trying to operate as a nation-state, providing social welfare, financing, and advanced military training and weapons programs, experts said. 

Sky News said it obtained the footage from the Free Syrian Army, which found eight hours of unedited video on a captured ISIS trainer. U.S. officials declined to comment on the specific claims in the video, but did not dispute the claims or the authenticity of the video.

Contact Us