PDA

View Full Version : Beyond the frontline: watching ISIS



Pages : [1] 2

davidbfpo
07-08-2014, 09:45 PM
Londonistani is back, now commenting on the Middle East; analysing al-Baghdadi's "I'm the Caliph" speech at Friday prayers in Mosul:http://www.londonstani.com/blog/2014/7/8/baghdadis-sermon-analysing-the-narratives


As opposed to Osama's empty threats and Zawahiri's tirades, Baghdadi casts Muslims as not a downtrodden people but a nation - represented by his caliphate - who are ready to extract their revenge. Unlike his AQ predecessors, he isn't looking for unrealistic concessions from Western powers but demands allegiance and assistance from Muslims across the world - his new constituency.

But it's about more than just messaging. ISIS has learnt how to synchronise its communications, military and political efforts for best effect. It makes sense that the group would use Sunni frustration in Iraq to cobble together an alliance to take territory. But to hold its gains, it seems to need to move quickly from a shaky coalition based on Sunni grievance to something bigger. The announcement of the Caliphate and the bold speech are part of that.He concludes:
Like AQ, ISIS's weak spots are its inflexibility, extreme sectarianism and propensity for bloodshed. And like AQ, it gains support when it can claim to be acting to "save" its core Sunni community. As many commentators have said, in real terms the announcement of Baghdadi's caliphate may mean little, but the Jihadi movement has turned a significant corner and what remains to be seen is what he can use it to do next.Sharp-eyed observers noticed he was wearing an expensive Rolex watch on his wrist.

Londonistani had had a break from blogging, he has been working to support the media work of the Syrian opposition. His old thread on Pakistan is here:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=8870

There is a short commentary on:http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_world_/2014/07/07/baghdadi_appearance_the_world_s_terrorists_aren_t_ exactly_flocking_to_pledge.html

Moderator's Note: thread closed and a new thread started upon President Trump being sworn in:Responding to ISIS & Terrorism under President Trump (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/Responding%20to%20ISIS%20&%20Terrorism%20under%20President%20Trump)

Bill Moore
07-09-2014, 12:16 AM
Londonistani is back, now commenting on the Middle East; analysing al-Baghdadi's "I'm the Caliph" speech at Friday prayers in Mosul:http://www.londonstani.com/blog/2014/7/8/baghdadis-sermon-analysing-the-narratives


He concludes:
Sharp-eyed observers noticed he was wearing an expensive Rolex watch on his wrist.

Londonistani had had a break from blogging, he has been working to support the media work of the Syrian opposition. His old thread on Pakistan is here:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=8870

There is a short commentary on:http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_world_/2014/07/07/baghdadi_appearance_the_world_s_terrorists_aren_t_ exactly_flocking_to_pledge.html

I keep reading about these Western analysts stating al-Qaeda's and al-Qaedaism weak point is its extremism, yet its extremism is what defines them. Furthermore, 10 plus years on since 9/11 al-Qaedaism has spread, and continues to spread, its influence over greater swaths of the Middle East and Africa, and their message still resonates with, potentially growing numbers of, extremists in East Asia. All these analysts may be prove to be right over time, and to some extent I suspect they will, but it will be long time before they collapse under their own weight. The Taliban didn't collapse because they were extremists, they collapsed due to our military action, and they made a successful comeback that they're maintaining despite our military pressure. If all this is weakness, I sure would hate to see a successful terrorist movement.

carl
07-09-2014, 12:38 AM
I keep reading about these Western analysts stating al-Qaeda's and al-Qaedaim's weak point is its extremism, yet its extremism is what defines them. Furthermore, 10 plus years on since 9/11 al-Qaedaism is spread, and continues to spread, its influence over greater swaths of the Middle East and Africa, and their message still resonates with potentially growing numbers in East Asia. All these analysts may be prove to be right over time, and to some extent I suspect they will, but it will be long time before they collapse under their own weight. The Taliban didn't collapse because they were extremists, they collapsed due to our military action, and they made a successful comeback that they're maintaining. If all this is weakness, I sure would hate to see a successful terrorist movement.

You are very right as the 20th Century would seem to prove. The Bolsheviks and Red Chinese were extremists and very successful. Extremism is perhaps an advantage in turbulent times.

My grandfather fought in the Mexican Revolution 100 years ago. He was an educator and a refined man, double tough but refined. One of the most disturbing things to him about that era was that brutal men, extremists so to speak, had an inordinate amount of influence because of their extremism. In turbulent times like those they were listened to and followed.

jcustis
07-09-2014, 04:33 PM
Londonistani had had a break from blogging, he has been working to support the media work of the Syrian opposition. His old thread on Pakistan is here:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ead.php?t=8870


Good heads-up on Amil Khan's return David. I like that guy's style of writing.

davidbfpo
07-09-2014, 06:25 PM
Jon,

We are friends, much to the surprise of some of his friends and are due to meet next week I shall pass on your compliment.

Bill Moore
07-09-2014, 07:15 PM
You are very right as the 20th Century would seem to prove. The Bolsheviks and Red Chinese were extremists and very successful. Extremism is perhaps an advantage in turbulent times.

My grandfather fought in the Mexican Revolution 100 years ago. He was an educator and a refined man, double tough but refined. One of the most disturbing things to him about that era was that brutal men, extremists so to speak, had an inordinate amount of influence because of their extremism. In turbulent times like those they were listened to and followed.

I see this type of analysis again and again, especially from our folks in the Department of State, but I think it is deeply flawed and without any intellectual merit whatsoever. They're looking at the world through rose colored glasses and make the assumption that all societies desire to embrace our liberal way of life. I'm confident that few people want to embrace the extremist way of life, but that doesn't mean they can or will stand up against them. Hard power trumps soft power when someone is willing to use it, and the extremists are. We saw this with Hitler, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Saddam, Kim Jung il, and now Islamist extremists.

There is little evidence of successful revolts against hard power if they don't have external support. The Taliban were expelled from power in Afghanistan due to military power. The Northern Alliance would never have freed Afghanistan from their grip without it. Saddam and his Bathist party weren't going to leave office as long as controlled their security forces without U.S. intervention. The oppressed people of North Korea are in no position to rise up. What state occupied by Nazi Germany was able to free itself via a resistance movement? None, resistance movements were little more than a nuance. A lot of folks in China didn't like Mao, a lot of those folks died in various purges. A lot of folks in the USSR didn't like communism, initially they thought Germany during WWII would liberate them (opportunity missed by Hitler), but they could rise up effectively, and Stalin killed how many millions? The list goes on, and yet we still have arm chair analysts who comfortably from afar predict extremism doesn't work. If you look at over a period of decades, then maybe, but it has been proven to be effective as a means of control for many decades in many places.

Revisit the theory of "competitive control" and then identify what elements are organized to establish control of the populace if the government falls? In the Middle East is either the Military, the Muslim Brotherhood, or the extremists that can quickly exploit the chaos that follows state collapse. Beautiful, peaceful, and effective democracies don't simply arise from the ashes.

These comments were a little harsher than intended, but strategy must be based on reality, not political correctness.

Bill Moore
07-13-2014, 06:21 PM
Moderator's Note

Prompted by Will McCants article (See Post 28) I thought a thread on ISIS beyond the frontline - which currently dominates the MSM - would be useful. Not the news reporting, rather lessons learned, analysis and commentary as an adversary - for many - and as a threat.

I will endeavour to copy appropriate posts from other threads, notably the current Iraq thread and elsewhere. Outlaw09 has already referred to the information available years ago on ISIS / AQ in Iraq, that was deemed of little value - so I am sure he will chime in (ends).



http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/07/11/233107/witnesses-describe-how-islamists.html?sp=%2F99%2F100%2F&ihp=1

Witnesses describe how Islamists leveled Sunni village as a warning


The Islamic State heralded the “cleansing” of the village, which is near Tikrit in northern Iraq, in an Internet posting, bragging that it had blown up villagers’ homes, which it called “hideouts,” killed 28, wounded many more and driven the remainder from the village. It warned that “all those who may even think about fighting the Islamic State and conspiring against the caliphate can know what their fate will be.”

The threat was clearly aimed at any suggestion that Sunni Muslim tribes would organize to fight the Islamic State _ a strategy that the U.S. military used to defeat al Qaida in Iraq during the American occupation. The extremist rebels now have seized roughly half the country with little resistance from Iraq’s hobbled army, and it’s unclear how they could be routed short of a tribal uprising or foreign airstrikes.“
Our men were ready to fight, but it was the mortar barrage that won the battle,” Jubouri said. “Negotiators were calling everyone they knew on the other side, but the other side refused.”Assuming this report is accurate, at least there are sources indicating it is, I think it points out two things: the IS are very worried about tribal uprisings and are attempting to quell them before they can gather steam through the use of terror. The same type of terror Saddam used to quell any tribes or organizations that were plotting to rise up against him.

Second, and I realize this is reach based on one statement in the article, but "if our men were ready to fight" is true, then the divisions between IS and the tribes may already being taking place.

Bob's World
07-14-2014, 01:04 PM
ISIS's hardest fight and greatest challenges will come after they "win."

They will find that their state sponsors will shift their support to more moderate voices that are more likely to govern in a manner that is not a challenge to their interests.

They will find that many who either joined them or simply stood on the sidelines as they surged to push back current state control will form into discrete and active organizations with their own popular bases of support to compete for turf, influence or even dominance.

They may have to deal with a Shia based, Iranian backed counterattack that will come in a wide range of asymmetric and irregular forms. To include Shia foreign fighters from India and elsewhere who are every bit as motivated as the Sunni foreign fighters working with ISIS today.

The better governance the people hope for will likely elude them for a decade or a generation or two or three. It is a process.

Like the US learned in 03, ISIS will get the big strategic lesson learned - "winning" is the easy part.

OUTLAW 09
07-25-2014, 09:04 PM
JWing---an interesting article from Haaretz on the tactics of the IS indicates with new recruits their strength is being estimated at the 20,000 range which as you indicated they are holding as their reserves in the rear---estimated hardcore fighters at 3,000.

This does not evidently include the Sunni coalition forces from IAI, al Duri, and the tribes.

http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/1.606590

JWing
07-28-2014, 06:29 PM
I just published an interview with Small Wars Council's own Outlaw 09 aka Richard Buchanan. He goes through the development of the insurgency in Iraq's Diyala province, the entry of militias, the start of the civil war there and how the U.S. was caught in the middle of these warring factions never really understanding the environment they were working in. Here is a link to the interview (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2014/07/how-iraqs-civil-war-broke-out-in-diyala.html).

davidbfpo
08-03-2014, 02:30 PM
A perceptive WaPo commentary, albeit with a Middle East focus, so IMHO not a global fact today. Three phrases:
We see Islamist fighters becoming skilled soldiers...These fighters are now well-armed, well-trained and well-led and are often flush with cash to buy or bribe their way out of difficulties. (At the end) As terrorist groups turn into armies, pairing their fanatical dedication with newly acquired tactical skills, renewed intervention might generate casualties on a new scale — as the Israelis have been painfully learning.

Link:http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/terrorist-armies-are-fighting-smarter-and-deadlier-than-ever/2014/08/01/3998ae00-18db-11e4-9e3b-7f2f110c6265_story.html

The authors are:
Robert H. Scales, a retired Army major general, is a former commandant of the U.S. Army War College. Douglas A. Ollivant is a fellow at the New America Foundation’s Future of War project.

This also appears on SWJBlog, so link added that a thread has been started.

carl
08-04-2014, 03:10 PM
This is something that shouldn't be a surprise. It has happened before. It probably always happens.

For example, it is described from the insurgent's side in Tom Barry's Guerrilla Days in Ireland. He was a former British soldier that trained up the flying columns to a very high level of small unit proficiency, thereby upping the ante. One of the things he said was that a group of intelligent and motivated men could be trained to a level of tactical accomplishment equalling the best regular troops in a week.

It was an excellent book by the way and should be on the small wars required reading list.

ganulv
08-09-2014, 05:58 AM
Zenpundit comments that one of the aspects of their genius is despite their horrific cruelty, they are still hanging on to a sort of moral high ground in the Muslim world, witness all those young foreign men flocking to their banner. He compares it to the sort of moral high ground the Commies held for decades amongst so many people in the West despite their murdering tens of millions.

There was a certain kind of Western support for the Soviet project in its earliest years. There was even an analogous emigration to the Soviet Union. There was a very different, at-a-distance support after Stalin Gulag-ed and purged those emigrants. It’s way too soon to see if things will play out the same way with the IS. But AQ in Iraq had decent popular support at one point, too, but they couldn’t help overplaying their hand. And this crew has been rejected by AQ in Iraq for being too hardcore!


These guys are damn smart. It hurts to say that about people so bad but I think it is true.

They’ve done a good job of seeing the opportunity in a crisis, there’s no denying that.

It’s apples and oranges in the end, but after your comparison to the Bolsheviks had sat with me for a couple of hours it occurred to me that as extremist leftist movements go, the IS reminds me more of the Shining Path. They’re completely uncompromising and own up to the violence they perpetrate. They can keep the members of a civilian populace and a government apparatus in states of terror, but they don’t really have much of a plan for maintaining a society. There are societies that have been run on pure fear for decades, but the showrunners came to power singing a different tune. The initial years of Kim-il Sung and Gaddafi had something of a mandate, and those two leveraged their mandates into strangleholds on civil society. There’s really not any indication that the IS has anything like a mandate, is there?

Anyway, just thinking out loud. I certainly don’t think “out of sight, out of mind” is the way to treat the IS, if that isn’t clear.

novelist
08-09-2014, 12:39 PM
Jwing---was working through some research on Shia and Sunni historical development and stumbled across the former al Baghdadi history and shifted from him into the Caliph concept historically represented in the various Islamic historical writings.

If you noticed outside of the first outbursts from leading Sunni thinkers about the Caliph being wrong---it has gone silent.

If my readings are correct--- because the historical writings and the use of the name of the former al Baghdadi seems and again Islamic historical writings are always open to interpretation---seems that the IS made a shrewd move on their part and in fact the IS might have the right interpretation of the historical writings.

In the Sunni Islamic stream of faith there are currently three Salafist groups moving at the same time and parallel to each other; 1) the purists who are not political and are fully into Islam and it's meanings, 2) the political types who are throwing out the terms down with US control of the ME/against globalization as it effects the ME etc and where a small number then drift into 3) the jihadists side.

There is an old German saying here in Berlin not all Salafists are terrorists, but all terrorists are Salafists.

If you look at al Baghdadi's statements since he has taken over and the IS actions they are in fact riding all three streams of the Salafist movement and appeal to all factions even al Duri's faction as the Sufi have been the "spreaders" of the faith for a really long time.

IMO al Baghdadi and the IS have hit the middle point of the Salafist movement that the AQ mothership failed in reaching even under UBL. The AQ mothership needs to be forewarned as al Baghdadi is not going away any time soon nor as it appears the IS is either.

IS moved fast in taking and holding ground. The terrorist troops are well trained. Why? Because they have technical knowledge as to how to operate tanks and AFV's. This suggests that the [Sunni]fighters of IS are former [Saddam Era] Iraqi Army officers, Republican Guard, and Fedayeen. It is interesting to me that in the media you see these "experts" commenting on the BRUTALITY of IS, but none has raised the point that IS atrocities and the public display of those atrocities in the social media and otherwise are making full use of PSYOPS. IS defeats its opposition psychologically before it ever encounters them in the field. It reminds me somewhat of what Sun Tzu said about the optimum in warfare is having the ability to defeat your enemy without firing a shot. I don't see men of absolutely no military experience having the mental disposition to wage war like the IS terrorists do. The approach is too professional even if it is reprehensible under the Rules of Land Warfare.

Bill Moore
08-09-2014, 03:11 PM
novelist,

The IS has former members of Saddam's army, but probably more relevant they have former members of the Syrian Army. Additionally the different terrorist groups have members from various militaries to include Pakistan and even some western armies. Finding folks with the expertise to teach someone to use the various pieces of ground equipment, or simply looking that up online, shouldn't be too hard. Gaining expertise (practice) is another thing, and then using all that equipment together in a combined arms fashion is another thing altogether. Reports indicate they're employing a combined arms approach, so to me that indicates that some rather senior former military leaders are instrumental in this movement. Maybe not, but it looks like, and smells like that is the case.

For everyone else if you haven't seen the PBS special it worth the 90 minutes to watch it.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/losing-iraq/?elq=17de837c85084f7c963d59dcfe4acc9e&elqCampaignId=1000

Losing Iraq

Also worth reading:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/iraq-war-on-terror/losing-iraq/inside-the-rise-of-isis/?elq=17de837c85084f7c963d59dcfe4acc9e&elqCampaignId=1000

Inside the Rise of ISIS

According to the author this situation would have happened regardless of whether the uprising in Syria happened or not.


That process, as far as I’m concerned, actually began as early as mid-to-late 2009. It was at that point that the Islamic State was in some ways forced to devolve into a typical terrorist organization. At that point it relocated much of its central leadership to Mosul [Iraq], which was a relative safe zone, and it was at that point that it essentially began its period of recovery.


The “Soldier’s Harvest” campaign has been the second of two 12-month campaigns. The first one was the campaign known as “Breaking the Walls.”

One of the primary objectives of that operation was to re-establish sources of leverage against security forces. A lot of that was done through a very significant campaign of intimidation — including collecting local intelligence on the addresses and family details of local security forces across the country.

A secondary objective of that initial campaign was the breaking out of prison of not only ordinary Islamic State foot soldiers, but most importantly, senior leading commanders, who’d been in prison for the final year or so of the U.S.-led surge in Iraq.

slapout9
08-09-2014, 03:19 PM
IS moved fast in taking and holding ground. The terrorist troops are well trained. Why? Because they have technical knowledge as to how to operate tanks and AFV's. This suggests that the [Sunni]fighters of IS are former [Saddam Era] Iraqi Army officers, Republican Guard, and Fedayeen. It is interesting to me that in the media you see these "experts" commenting on the BRUTALITY of IS, but none has raised the point that IS atrocities and the public display of those atrocities in the social media and otherwise are making full use of PSYOPS. IS defeats its opposition psychologically before it ever encounters them in the field. It reminds me somewhat of what Sun Tzu said about the optimum in warfare is having the ability to defeat your enemy without firing a shot. I don't see men of absolutely no military experience having the mental disposition to wage war like the IS terrorists do. The approach is too professional even if it is reprehensible under the Rules of Land Warfare.


That is an excellent analysis. The experts are approaching this all wrong. This is a Religious War and you must destroy the counter value targets first! Then go to counter force targets. That is part of the reason I keep pounding on some of the points I have made regardless of how controversial they may seem.

ISIS is demonstrating that their God is more powerful than our God. If you want to defeat them you must destroy "THEIR" symbols of Religious authority and legitimacy, otherwise they are continuing to demonstrate that their God is better than every one else's, which gives them a tremendous psychological and recruiting advantage.

The American military must admit that their old analysis and warfare techniques are not going to work and somehow face the fact that they must change their thinking and face the fact that this is not an Insurgency but is a Religious struggle for world domination.

Bill Moore
08-09-2014, 04:28 PM
Yes, ISIS is waging a religious war, but what percent of the global Muslim population does ISIS represent? Worse case would be 10% (that is certainly high). You want to blow up religious symbols which will generate even more support for them. You accuse the President of being a secret Muslim, even if he was so what? Yet you're the one promoting a strategy that would support ISIS. Think about the 2d and 3d order effects of what you're promoting.

Destroying religious symbols is little more than an emotional approach that would accomplish nothing militarily, and only serve to set us back politically. ISIS is waging a religious war, we are NOT waging a religious war just because one of our adversaries are. We are waging a war against AQAA. The religious aspect is critical, but that doesn't mean we need to engage in religious war, we just need to understand our adversary is and what that means.

Consider reversing your proposal, if someone blew up your church would you roll over and quit? Or would you mobilize and resist harder? History indicates most will pursue the second option.

KingJaja
08-09-2014, 07:09 PM
Boko Haram warned Christians to flee Northern Nigeria in January 2012. Nobody can tell my that the similarity between this an ISIS behaviour is mere happenstance. This is a face of Islam, that many of us are too "politically correct" to confront.


(CNN) -- The militant Islamist group Boko Haram has issued an ultimatum giving Christians living in northern Nigeria three days to leave the area amid a rising tide of violence there.
A Boko Haram spokesman, Abul Qaqa, also said late Sunday that Boko Haram fighters are ready to confront soldiers sent to the area under a state of emergency declared in parts of four states by Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan on Saturday.
"We will confront them squarely to protect our brothers," Abul Qaqa said during a telephone call with local media. He also called on Muslims living in southern Nigeria to "come back to the north because we have evidence they will be attacked."
Recent weeks have seen an escalation in clashes between Boko Haram and security forces in the north-eastern states of Borno and Yobe, as well as attacks on churches and assassinations. Nearly 30 people were killed on Christmas Day at a Catholic church near the federal capital, Abuja -- a sign that Boko Haram is prepared to strike beyond its heartland.
Human rights activist Shehu Sani told CNN that the latest Boko Haram threat is credible, but many Christians born and raised in the north have nowhere else to go.
"The killings will continue," he said, and Boko Haram may respond to the state of emergency by taking its campaign of violence to areas not yet affected.

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/01/02/world/africa/nigeria-sectarian-divisions/index.html

slapout9
08-11-2014, 08:26 PM
Link to Pat Lang comment on ISIS Tactics.

http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2014/08/httpwwwbloombergcomnews2014-08-07iraqi-islamists-overrun-christian-towns-in-push-for-major-damshtml.html

slapout9
08-11-2014, 08:46 PM
Link not working for me.


try this this one and scroll down to 7 AUG 2014 for the post I am talking about.

http://turcopolier.typepad.com/

OUTLAW 09
08-13-2014, 04:00 PM
To add to Bill's commentary, U.S. capabilities are still miles ahead of the next competitor. Sure, the U.S. has its structural problems and a strong argument can be made that U.S. power relative to other states is declining, but there still is a long ways to go for other states to become peers. Much of the problem in the U.S. is self-imposed (political dysfunction, financial constraints, etc).

As for Iraq - well, unfortunately Bill is correct that some kind of action is required and that the Obama administration is trapped in the past. It's hard to see any other way to address the problem of ISIS without further commitments to Iraq's security. I see ISIS as the culmination of an escalation cycle of Al Qaeda, starting with the initial pre-9/11 spectacular attacks, and now with a movement that is relatively well-organized and disciplined. This is a problem two decades in the making and it will be some time, and will take more than just airstrikes, to resolve it.

The former QJBR then AQI then ISIL and now IS while initially looking towards the AQ mothership during the founding years and Zarqawi having been in AFG ---even Zarqawi was on the outs with UBL/AQ by 2006, and was "disowned" if one takes the time to go back and read all of the edicts/fatwas that flew back and forth between Iraq and Pakistan/AFG during that period.

IS has been "disowned" as well by AQ in 2014, and in fact has become a competitor of the first order and virtually the richest "terrorist" group in the world right now--AQ is nowhere close on the financial side.

It has a far greater recruiting pull that does AQ in general and has received the allegiance oaths to the new Caliphate/al Baghdadi from virtually all of the branch AQ groups.

IS does not need nor will it need in the future to have ties with or be associated with AQ.

IS is a new breed of insurgency, radical Takfiri in nature and aggressive.

It is displaying a remarkable adaptability ---meaning they changed within hours their ground tactics after being bombed, they are in fact using an excellence mission command that the current Army cannot match---actually if one takes the time to read the JCoS's Mission Command article from 2012 one might in fact notice al Baghdadi is copying it to the letter.

Military tactics on the ground---swarming attacks in a fashion not seen in the ME coupled with a complete understanding of maneuver.

One can see the insurgency learning curve experience gained in Iraq coupled with the battlefield experience gained in Syria.

The key though while engaging IS---do not attack Islam as the supposed problem---this is a radical Takfiri ie terrorist group---attack instead the concept of terrorism.

By focusing say on the supposed Islamic side of the problem just creates a better recruiting narrative. Meaning the message to the youth--see the West is attacking Islam thus you must strike back and protect it. This message is pulling extremely well now especially when they can show battlefield successes against the enemies of the IS---meaning anything other than a Takfiri.

Why the hesitation right now might be explained in the simple fact---no one can seem to explain their sudden military tactics, their battlefield successes and what drives them. No one can quite see the interrelationship between IS and the Sunni coalition headed by al Duri and no one can foresee just how/why the Sunni tribes are now an unknown factor.

As an example---the Christians surrounded in the mountains are being circled by no more than 350 fighters in light trucks that are just driving in circles at the base of the mountain range---350 fighters clashed with the Peshmerga and basically defeated the myth that the Psehmerga are the great northern fighters.

Problem is ---it was all there to be seen from 2002 to 2010 and past 2010--we in our hurry to declare a COIN victory did not want to take the time to understand what we were seeing.

Example---why was Baghdadi parked in Bucca which was reserved for Wahhabi's and the more radical types--yet released and never sent to trial by the US or the Iraqi's. I have not seen any info on his arrest, his internment first in Abu Ghraib and then why he was placed in Bucca--anyone sent to Abu G and Bucca even if not guilty of anything attended for a period of time one of the finest insurgency training centers in the ME and the US did nothing to stop it.

Understanding the rise of al Baghdadi is the critical piece-ie he is displaying a serious sign of being a solid religious leader, a solid battlefield tactician/commander, he is a solid group leader, and an astute understander of the West--not Islam- not the IS is the problem---understanding al Baghdadi is the issue.

Thus the hesitancy in the US as they cannot "figure out" al Baghdadi and his end state game.

davidbfpo
08-13-2014, 05:27 PM
Two different viewpoints from London. One by a Kings War Studies academic, who also lectures to Qatar's military, so may have extra value; entitled 'How to best externalize the R2P in Iraq?':http://kingsofwar.org.uk/2014/08/how-to-best-externalize-the-r2p-in-iraq/

Personally I think his option for regaining support from disaffected Sunni tribes is long past. Nor are regional 'powers' that willing to commit.

As the UK sends Tornado recce aircraft, Chinooks and Hercules transports, all ostensibly for humanitarian purposes Shashank Joshi, from RUSI, examines 'British Options in Iraq: Capabilities, Strategies, and Risks':https://www.rusi.org/analysis/commentary/ref:C53EB5BC49555B/#.U-t10aORcdW

His sub-title is:
Pressure is building for the government to recall parliament over the crisis in Iraq and consider intervening alongside US forces. But what are the options for Britain, and what risks do they carry?

I am not sure where this pressure is coming from - beyond Whitehall. Given this government's stance on supporting the USA, it is likely to be Washington that is applying pressure.


In anticipation of these choices, we should therefore ask – of ourselves, and of ministers – what is Britain’s strategy in any intervention? A non-exhaustive list would include:

One-off degradation of ISIS’ offensive capabilities;
One-off humanitarian relief;
Indirect support to Kurdish forces;
Indirect support to Iraqi government forces;
A longer mission to contain ISIS, until those local forces gain strength;
A direct and sustained aerial campaign to destroy ISIS – or even more broadly, 'the defeat of jihadism (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iraq/11026422/Britain-must-give-the-Kurds-the-tools-to-lead-Iraq-out-of-this-mess.html)';
Some combination thereof.

davidbfpo
08-13-2014, 06:16 PM
To look for the "root cause" of Isis is to miss the point. The group represents all the subterranean barbarism that every so often is apt to crawl, blinking into the light, out from the depths of the human subconscious.

Certainly an interesting POV and a reminder that ISIS is not new, nor just an extreme form of Islam IMHO:http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/why-does-isis-hate-us-so-much-9664506.html

Bill Moore
08-13-2014, 06:42 PM
Certainly an interesting POV and a reminder that ISIS is not new, nor just an extreme form of Islam IMHO:http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/why-does-isis-hate-us-so-much-9664506.html

From the enclose article David kindly posted


despite the SS repeatedly reaffirming at its death camps that "here there is no why", for much of the left there was always a "why".

This underscores much of the debate in SWJ circles. We have those who believe the reason is failed government, economics, etc. Root causes that we can somehow address, and then the world will be all rainbows and unicorns again.

We have others, closer to my school of thought, that often there are no root causes that we can address. We waste our time and money with our various development programs when they're directed to weaken AQ and other extremists.

The left hates to hear this, but sometimes it really does come down to killing those who are trying to kill you. Alternative approaches against sadistic killers have failed us repeatedly. To those who say we can't shoot our way out of this, I offer that the collective we can and we must. BUT, and this is an important but, we must do so in a discriminate manner, and in a way that doesn't mobilize the neutrals to turn against us. The extremists are a greater threat to the majority of Muslims than they are to us, so calls to go war with Islam are frankly unethical and misguided. However, aggressively pursuing and eliminating ISIS is a necessity if value our security and way of life. In Iraq they have formed an Army, if they choose to fight us semi-symmetrically they will make our work that much easier.

These thoughts are directed towards AQ, those who embraced Al-Qaedaism, and their associates and affiliates. Those the author would call fascists. The above is not an approach to deal with insurgents that have valid political issues they're trying to fix.


But let us be clear: the "root cause" of fascism (and what Isis is practicing us clerical fascism) is an absolute rejection of a plural and democratic society. It is our existence, rather than the subtleties of how we behave, that is intolerable to Isis, hence current attempts to exterminate "un-Islamic" religious minorities in Iraq – a genocide-in the making thankfully being thwarted by the United States.

JWing
08-13-2014, 07:11 PM
Bill

I think of the Surge strategy of those you can reconcile with and those that you can't. IS is one of the latter and you have to kill them. At the same time there are plenty of Sunnis and some insurgent groups that you can turn and those are the ones that you need to reach out to with political reconciliation, development projects, etc. That can also hopefully turn away more people from joining IS. I don't think it's an either or.

KingJaja
08-13-2014, 07:26 PM
From the enclose article David kindly posted



This underscores much of the debate in SWJ circles. We have those who believe the reason is failed government, economics, etc. Root causes that we can somehow address, and then the world will be all rainbows and unicorns again.

We have others, closer to my school of thought, that often there are no root causes that we can address. We waste our time and money with our various development programs when they're directed to weaken AQ and other extremists.


In Nigeria, where I come from, Western analysts are all over the place about Boko Haram & how poverty and alienation are its root causes - but when you ask them about local Christians who are even poorer and more alienated (because the power structures the British left behind empowered the Muslims in Northern Nigeria) - they are blank.

I suspect Iraqi Christians and Yazidis would feel the same way as African Christians about the way the Western academic elite has chosen to explain away violent Islamism.

In the Middle East, the West can comfortably ignore religious minorities as they aren't likely ever have any political power (all US presidents do so; whether Republican or Democrat). In Africa, the Christians aren't likely to be politically insignificant, but as far as the West is concerned, Africa is a strategic backwater.

So the liberal narrative of Islamist terrorism is likely to persist - as these movements will never be an existential threat to the West like Hitler & Nazis.

davidbfpo
08-14-2014, 10:33 PM
Shashank Joshi, of RUSI, has another article 'Where does the Islamic State's fetish with beheading people come from?':http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/shashankjoshi/100283197/why-are-islamic-state-militants-beheading-people/

He tries to answer this:
What, though, is the purpose of such brutality? The jihadists of the Islamic State (IS) are not, after all, nihilists. .....they are a highly professional military force, more similar to an army than insurgents, and seek a well-administered Islamic state. So why engage in beheadings and crucifixions? (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/syria/10933851/Isis-crucifies-nine-people-in-Syrian-villages.html)

First, psychological warfare is a key part of IS’s military strategy.

Second, IS understands that Western governments are, to some extent, dissuaded by the prospect of a British or American soldier meeting with a similar fate.

Third, terrorism is a form of propaganda by the deed. And the more chilling the deed, the more impactful the propaganda.

Now this is unexpected - well for me:
The first is that it can induce your enemies to fight even harder, because surrendering is such an awful option. One academic study shows that (http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=4DirOe72cf0C&pg=PA68&lpg=PA68&dq=%22The+Wehrmacht%E2%80%99s+policy+of+treating+S oviet+POWs+brutally+also+undercut+German+military+ effectiveness+on+the+Eastern+front%22&source=bl&ots=Vo2gbRVOq1&sig=BMb20_dXi1bjoN8mCNLVkhx6xHc&hl=en&sa=X&ei=3rvsU5-WJoHTObzMgYgC&redir_esc=y) “the Wehrmacht’s policy of treating Soviet POWs brutally undercut German military effectiveness on the Eastern front”. Moreover, the Soviets’ own relative brutality to Germans meant that German soldiers fought harder in Russia than in Normandy. The lesson? IS can make its enemies flee, but it would be a foolish Iraqi unit that surrendered – and the net effect is that IS has to fight all the harder.

OUTLAW 09
08-15-2014, 12:37 PM
An interesting article on IS written just before Malaki was pushed out---the conclusion paragraphs are interesting and go to what Bill M was mentioning---it must take a full fledged ground war to push out IS but by the current actors on the ground and that appears to not be the case in the coming months.

Some interesting comments on the IS and how it is governing in areas taken over that seems to clash with the standard media take that they are all crazies and brutal.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-08-12/isis-and-coming-escalation-iraq?page=2

ISIS has attracted an entire generation of radicalized Sunni militants to the region. If one watches interviews with their enemies such as e.g. Peshmerga fighters, one topic that is occasionally mentioned is that they don't seem to fear death much. Combined with their well-known brutality, this undoubteldy makes them a formidable fighting force. However, there is evidently far more to ISIS than that.

In this context, we recommend watching the Vice News report on ISIS filmed in Raqqa, the current capital of the “caliphate”. One impression one comes away with is that ISIS is quite careful not to alienate the population too much, in spite of strictly enforcing the sharia. Along similar lines, since ISIS is running Mosul, a number of Sunnis that have initially fled have returned to the city – which for the first time in an eternity has electricity around the clock. ISIS is a bit like Hitler in that way: it is so to speak making the trains run on time, while mercilessly killing large numbers of its perceived enemies and assorted “apostates” at the same time. The group also runs what appears to be a highly effective propaganda campaign – not only via electronic media, but also on the ground in the areas it conquers (its recruitment drive in Iraq is flourishing).

The Islamic State even has something like a national anthem by now, a jihadist anasheed (a piece of Islamic a capella music with very light or no instrumentation) – “Ummaty Qad Laha Farujn” (My Ummah, Dawn Has Appeared) – which actually sounds quite interesting (never mind the martial lyrics). In fact, the music is probably the only good thing to come from ISIS so far:

The ISIS “anthem” Ummaty Qad Laha Farujn – an interesting sounding a capella piece in the anasheed style

All of the above suggests that it will be exceedingly difficult to effectively destroy ISIS. One method of countering it would in theory be the strategy that has already been successfully employed in almost defeating its predecessor organization AQI (“Al Qaeda in Iraq”). This mainly involved alienating AQI from its local support base. A guerrilla force cannot persist unless it has the support of the local population. However, it seems uncertain whether the same strategy can be used with success again. For one thing, Maliki's suppression of the Sunnis has made ISIS the lesser evil in the eyes of many locals. For another thing, the organization has evolved a great deal and is highly unlikely to repeat AQI's mistakes.

It seems to us that if the goals the president has announced in recent days are to be achieved, nothing short of a full-scale invasion of Iraq (as well as of Syria for good measure) is likely to suffice – and even then, success is by no means guaranteed. Another possibility – a remote one at this stage, but it cannot be ruled out just yet – is that the regional forces arrayed against ISIS actually get their act together for a change.

JWing
08-15-2014, 07:49 PM
I cannot recommend enough the writings of Fanar Haddad to understand sectarianism in Iraq. Here's one of his new articles "Secular Sectarians"

http://www.mei.edu/content/map/secular-sectarians

Sectarianism in Iraq and the Middle East is not so much about dogma or religious orthodoxy but control of the state and involve ideas about class and regionalism.

jcustis
08-20-2014, 12:29 PM
James Foley's beheading was different that anything I've seen before in the barbarism used by jihadists to strike home fear.

The open-air murders of kneeling, bound Iraqi civilians and soldiers dates back to 2003, and they follow a common theme that many of us with access to the raw footage have seen before.

Yesterday was very different, and Foley's captors seem to have taken some lengths to achieve a specific impact, based on several things the video shows.

First, they deliberately shaved his head, and have likely kept it shaved for some time. Considering the wooly-haired appearance of most IS fighter's
Foley's bare scalp showed something else. Perhaps they were trying to message frailty and weakness.

Second, the choice of a barren landscape seems chosen to evoke an image of the purity and strength of IS, as well as its dominating power even though it is being exerted over an unarmed man. As I watched the video, I truly felt as if I was right there watching events transpire. There was no clutter, no other IS knuckleheads in the frame touting rifles and wearing the paraphernalia of jihad. There was one masked murderer and one captive. pure black and pure orange. One lone knife.

The breeze blew at their garments, and the images took me back to every day spent underneath merciless suns in Iraq and Afghanistan. I felt my palms begin to sweat.

It was murder, plain and simple, and I felt so sad for Foley's family, friends and co-workers who have held on to hope that he is alive, only to know he suffered an unimaginable death as a pawn in a larger conflict.

This one seemed markedly different.

Bill Moore
08-21-2014, 01:42 AM
In Jomini's book, "The Art of War" he addresses this in the section in article VII of his book, titled "War of Opinion."

Jomini thinks along the line of Bob's World, when he states ,


religion is the pretext to obtain political power, and the war is not really one of the dogmas. The successors of Mohammed cared more to extend their empire than to preach the Koran,

He then accused the crusaders of thinking more of expanding trade than spreading Christianity.

Final quote


The dogma sometimes is not only a pretext, but is a powerful ally; for it excites the ardor of the people, and also creates a party.

Regardless, we have a security problem on our hands that is expanding. It is unlikely we will be able to address the root political, social, and economic causes of which I'm sure there are many, so our focus IMO is reducing the threat through military action in ways that mitigate further agitating the underlying phenomena that motivates this behavior. No one said it would be easy, but ignoring the problem because we can't address root causes in my view is a dangerous cop out.

OUTLAW 09
08-21-2014, 06:48 AM
In Jomini's book, "The Art of War" he addresses this in the section in article VII of his book, titled "War of Opinion."

Jomini thinks along the line of Bob's World, when he states ,



He then accused the crusaders of thinking more of expanding trade than spreading Christianity.

Final quote



Regardless, we have a security problem on our hands that is expanding. It is unlikely we will be able to address the root political, social, and economic causes of which I'm sure there are many, so our focus IMO is reducing the threat through military action in ways that mitigate further agitating the underlying phenomena that motivates this behavior. No one said it would be easy, but ignoring the problem because we can't address root causes in my view is a dangerous cop out.

Bill---you are now starting to see what I comment often about the Iraqi Sunni side--meaning when one fully understands what one is truly seeing then and only then can one move forward---we the US military never did fully understand what we were seeing.

jcurtis's comments are great---why because he fully saw the impact of the video--that is what they want--this group under Baghdadi is far more troubling because he is a thinking adapting and intelligent Amir--spiritual leader, a solid field commander and a great tactician.

That is why I keep going back and asking---what did we miss in Abu G and Bucca---it was there in 2005-2009 to see why did we the IC not see it and still do not see it?

It is also why I warned here to not start a bombing campaign as it would and has caused exactly what I anticipated would happen---they are far different than AQ---they can and will strike Americans--as single targets as that is the COG for the US=--not attacks on the homeland not attacks on towers--but a steady attack against Americans walking do the streets of Helsinki, Berlin, Hong Kong---literally anywhere in the world and no amount of CIA/DIA/NSA/DHS can hinder that. We are so easy to read thus the taking of US hostages long before they crossed the border into Iraq.

Had we not bombed the American would still be alive it is as simple as that as brutal as it sounds---AND now there is talk about more combat personnel into Iraq. And we as the US cannot get a straight policy on a far deeper threat---the new Russia/China which impacts us over the longer haul more so than Baghdadi ever will.

This we the US have not seen before in this "supposedly" GWOT.

There will be no defeating them---it is a long haul now and they are getting better and better at governing--the missing piece.

The former Iraq now is a true satellite of the Iranians and to a degree occupied by the Iranians which is what Baghdadi wanted in the first place--this is his Sunni Shia clash and notice the KSA outside of protecting their borders from returning fighters and hardening the internal security has not uttered a single comment against the Caliphate outside of the first series of comments.

KSA silence is an indicator.

davidbfpo
08-21-2014, 03:16 PM
A previously unheard of website, so maybe some caution. Their explanation for the data presented:
Vocativ has discovered, collated and tabulated the available data from monthly reports posted in various online forums affiliated with ISIS. The reports detail every ISIS attack in chronological order (see embed below). The ISIS reports were published by what the organization calls its “media ministry.” These reports were provided only in Arabic, which suggests ISIS wasn’t targeting them for Western exposure, but rather to spread news of its achievements throughout the Arabic-speaking world to would-be recruits and supporters. It should also be noted that, as ISIS generated the reports, not all details can be corroborated. Regardless, the organization’s data provides a detailed picture of how ISIS views itself and what its shifting priorities are in the battlefield.

Link:http://www.vocativ.com/world/iraq-world/analysis-isis-quarterly-reports-kill-conquer/?page=all#!bHpDun

davidbfpo
08-21-2014, 10:48 PM
A short, detailed article based on an interview of Professor John Horgan, a British psychologist now @ UMass-Lowell:http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2014/08/how-isis-seduces-new-recruits.html

A key point:
They’re offering an opportunity for people to feel powerful. They’re making disillusioned, disaffected radicals feel like they’re doing something truly meaningful with their lives.Are we and others ready for this?
Disillusionment is very, very common in every single terrorist and extremist group you can think of. That’s something that can be very toxic if those accounts get out and gather momentum.

Disillusionment is the most common reason why people voluntarily choose to walk away from a terrorist group. People become disillusioned if they feel that the group has gone too far, if they don’t seem to have a strategy beyond indiscriminate killing. Disillusionment can arise from disagreements with a leader, it can arise from dissatisfaction with the day-to-day minutiae. There are many directions from which disillusionment can arise, and it’s only a matter of time before those accounts leak out from ISIS, and I think we would do very well to be on the lookout for those kinds of accounts, because they offer an opportunity to dissuade further potential recruits from being involved.

davidbfpo
08-23-2014, 02:35 PM
A short article from The Guardian, best explained by the writer's bio:
Ali Khedery is chairman and chief executive of Dragoman Partners, a strategic consultancy. He served as special assistant to five American ambassadors in Iraq and as senior adviser to three heads of US Central Command from 2003-10. He was the longest continuously serving American official in Iraq.

He ends with:
As world leaders now consider a military campaign to confront Isis, they should remember the lessons of America's costly and largely fruitless engagements in Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam. They should understand that no amount of foreign military power can ever make up for the misrule of corrupt, failed governments like those in Damascus, Baghdad, Kabul or Saigon. Unless they want a regional holy war, leaders should especially discount the advice of some who are now calling for an alliance with Assad's genocidal regime – perhaps the single greatest root cause of Isis's rise.

Instead, they should embrace the lessons of Iraq's Sunni tribal awakening, that only Syrian and Iraqi Sunnis can defeat radical militant Sunni entities like Isis. Likewise, they should understand that only the mullahs in Tehran can help quell radical militant Shia entities like Lebanon's Hezbollah, Assad's intelligence operatives or Iraq's militias.


Link:http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/22/syria-iraq-incubators-isis-jihad?CMP=twt_gu

davidbfpo
08-26-2014, 10:58 PM
Prompted by Will McCants article (cited below) I thought a thread on ISIS beyond the frontline - which currently dominates the MSM - would be useful. Not the news reporting, rather lessons learned, analysis and commentary as an adversary - for many - and as a threat.

I will endeavour to copy appropriate posts from other threads, notably the current Iraq thread and elsewhere. Outlaw09 has already referred to the information available years ago on ISIS / AQ in Iraq, that was deemed of little value - so I am sure he will chime in.

Now back to Will McCants, a Brookings analyst, 'Five Myths about the Islamic State':http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/up-front/posts/2014/08/26-myths-about-islamic-state-mccants

davidbfpo
08-26-2014, 11:19 PM
Yassin Musharbash, a German-Jordanian journalist and Jihad watcher, has a short five point commentary '5 Things we don't know about the Caliphate':http://abususu.blogspot.de/2014/08/5-things-we-dont-know-about-caliphate.html

Why another five point eludes me. He explains, with his emphasis:
So in the interest of self-discipline, academic transparency and self-questioning, here is a brief list of the five most important things we (or I, at least) do not know about the Caliphate, but really wish I knew

davidbfpo
08-27-2014, 05:06 PM
Four quite different commentaries found today; two British and two American.

'The real threat from the Islamic State is to Muslims, not the west' by Sonny Handal. As the title implies he is worried:
In many ways it is perhaps the worst development in recent Muslim history since 9/11. There are two reasons for this: First, it is likely to cause even greater unrest in countries where Muslims aren't a majority, and second, the Islamic State group could tear apart the Middle East and cause further unrest for generations.

I have long argued that strategically it is important to keep India's Muslims in view, so this passage is not good news:
India, which has the world's second-largest Muslim population, is especially in shock after Islamic State sympathisers have turned up from Kashmir[/URL] in the north to Tamil Nadu in the south. There is not one recorded instance of an Indian Muslim having fought for al-Qaeda, but already four are suspected of having joined the group.

Link:http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/08/real-threat-from-islamic-state--201482316357532975.html (http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-isis-and-al-qaeda-flags-make-a-debut-in-kashmir-2006428)

Majid Nawaz, of the Quilliam Foundation, ex-radical, makes a good contribution on what ISIS means and its methods. His advocated response is wishful thinking:[URL]http://warontherocks.com/2014/08/what-the-middle-east-needs/#_

Paul Pillar I expect is known to American readers anyway an ex-CIA analyst and writes in 'National Interest':http://nationalinterest.org/blog/paul-pillar/isis-perspective-11150

It is very much IMHO a plea to recognise lessons learnt and ends with:
In that regard we cannot remind ourselves often enough—especially because this fact seems to have been forgotten amid the current discussion of ISIS—that ISIS itself was born as a direct result of the United States going after a different monster in Iraq.

The last article, the shortest, is a braoder outlook:
We’re caught in a revenge cycle with a death cult, and it’s redefining modern warfare.

Link:http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/08/26/what-the-islamic-state-learned-from-the-u-s-about-fighting-a-war/

davidbfpo
08-27-2014, 08:49 PM
Clint Watts (CWOT on SWC) has followed ISIS closer than most analysts. His short FPRI column asks: Why would the U.S. want to be ISIS’s ‘Far Enemy’?


For ISIS, attacking the U.S. may be a long-term objective but their base of support is mobilized by its delivery on objectives that al Qaeda touted but never moved on-–e.g., establishment of an Islamic State, governance by Sharia law, and widespread violence against all enemies of jihadi interpretations of Islam.

Link:http://www.fpri.org/geopoliticus/2014/08/why-would-us-want-be-isiss-far-enemy

davidbfpo
08-28-2014, 08:10 PM
From a long, mainly historical explanation, by Alistair Crooke: 'You Can't Understand ISIS If You Don't Know the History of Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia':http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alastair-crooke/isis-wahhabism-saudi-arabia_b_5717157.html?


ISIS is a "post-Medina" movement: it looks to the actions of the first two Caliphs, rather than the Prophet Muhammad himself, as a source of emulation, and it forcefully denies the Saudis' claim of authority to rule.His last paragraph is rather savage:
Why should we be surprised then, that from Prince Bandar's Saudi-Western mandate to manage the insurgency in Syria against President Assad should have emerged a neo-Ikhwan type of violent, fear-inducing vanguard movement: ISIS? And why should we be surprised -- knowing a little about Wahhabism -- that "moderate" insurgents in Syria would become rarer than a mythical unicorn? Why should we have imagined that radical Wahhabism would create moderates? Or why could we imagine that a doctrine of "One leader, One authority, One mosque: submit to it, or be killed" could ever ultimately lead to moderation or tolerance?

davidbfpo
08-28-2014, 10:15 PM
I have just copied over twentyseven posts from the current Iraq thread, back to pg.30 so approx. a month's review.

Our resident SME Joel Wing no doubt has commentaries on ISIS on his own website:http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.co.uk/

For those who want to look back before Mosul fell and a more strategic assessment I commend Clint Watts writing on FPRI:http://www.fpri.org/contributors/clint-watts and his own website:http://selectedwisdom.com/

I am sure there are other SME and ones outside the USA. If you know of any please post a link.

davidbfpo
08-29-2014, 03:07 PM
Two of the better articles seen today. First 'How to Beat the Islamic State' by Jeff Stein in Newsweek, which relies on those with experience, citing a number:http://www.newsweek.com/how-beat-islamic-state-267273

The second 'Let’s Keep ISIS in Perspective' is from a blogsite, the author Wayne White is a former INR officer and sounds caution:http://www.lobelog.com/lets-keep-isis-in-perspective/

davidbfpo
08-29-2014, 10:59 PM
Brian Jenkins of RAND has a short column:
The threat al-Baghdadi poses shouldn’t be dismissed, of course. But before the U.S. engages in what could be another messy military intervention in Iraq, one that may well extend into Syria, it’s worth taking a closer look at Islamic State and its internal dynamics. Contrary to the rhetoric, Islamic State does not surpass every threat the U.S. has seen.

Link:http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-08-28/islamic-states-financing-a-vulnerability#p1

ganulv
08-29-2014, 11:16 PM
Brian Jenkins of RAND has a short column:


[…] Contrary to the rhetoric, Islamic State does not surpass every threat the U.S. has seen. Link:http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-08-28/islamic-states-financing-a-vulnerability#p1

Duffel Blog scooped ’em (http://www.duffelblog.com/2014/08/hagel-cold-war-isil-terror-group/) on this one. :)

slapout9
08-30-2014, 03:27 AM
CNBC Interview from Montgomery,Al. Of retired USAF Colonel John Warden. "We have badly underestimated their capabilities"



http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000300411#.

davidbfpo
09-01-2014, 12:27 AM
Two real SME on the situation. One, Dr. Omar Ashour, now @ Exeter University, I always listen to. Here he is interviewed by Voice of Russia Today, with two others from UK Muslim groups, and provides the context for what we see today. There is a podcast and transcript:http://voiceofrussia.com/uk/news/2014_08_30/How-can-Britain-respond-to-terror-threat-from-home-grown-Islamic-jihad-2074/

Here is one passage:
In terms of ideology it’s sort of interesting because the Islamic State is a fringe of a fringe. So, al-Qaeda is a fringe and it took even more extreme twist in a sense that they are using excommunication declaring others as infidels and apostates in a much wider way than al-Qaeda does.

On intervention in Iraq, with some poignant pre-conditions:
The problem is very complex. There is ISIS and there is a threat, but ISIS are there because of certain reasons and some of them have to do with how the Arab Sunni population was treated in the last few years mainly by the al-Maliki government in the aftermath of the US withdrawal and the US invasion in 2003 as well. Unless these core issues are resolved and unless you find an Iraqi elite that is willing on one hand to unite against this threat, and on the other hand, is willing to accept intervention to end it, and you have a population that is revolting against the Islamic State […] Unless you have these conditions then I don’t think an intervention would be quite successful. Maybe it will undermine it or set it back a bit but then the environment, if you have this level of oppression and this level of brutality and lack of freedom, ethnic groups and religious groups who are marginalised and repressed, then you create an environment where the Islamic State or other groups will emerge just as violent and extreme.

Secondly there's Clint Watts (CWOT on SWC) in a long interview on CSPAN's Washington Journal, which I have yet to listen to:http://www.c-span.org/video/?321100-3/washington-journal-clinton-watts-us-response-isis

davidbfpo
09-03-2014, 10:28 PM
In this article 'Middle East Time Bomb: The Real Aim of ISIS Is to Replace the Saud Family as the New Emirs of Arabia', his second (the first is Post 34) Alistair Crooke he starts with:
SIS is indeed a veritable time bomb inserted into the heart of the Middle East. But its destructive power is not as commonly understood. It is not with the "March of the Beheaders"; it is not with the killings; the seizure of towns and villages; the harshest of "justice" -- terrible though they are -- that its true explosive power lies. It is yet more potent than its exponential pull on young Muslims, its huge arsenal of weapons and its hundreds of millions of dollars.

Its real potential for destruction lies elsewhere -- in the implosion of Saudi Arabia as a foundation stone of the modern Middle East. We should understand that there is really almost nothing that the West can now do about it but sit and watch.
Link:http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alastair-crooke/isis-aim-saudi-arabia_b_5748744.html

No wonder Iran and the Kingdom are talking.

We know there are a number of deserters from the Saudi military to ISIS; IIRC on the separate Saudi thread:

davidbfpo
09-09-2014, 11:47 PM
A short BBC commentary by Professor Fawaz A Gerges:
Since the sudden appearance of the extremist Sunni Islamic State (IS), the group has seized headlines with a shocking level of blood-letting and cruelty - but can its savagery be explained...

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-29123528

Here's a taster:
It is a conscious decision to terrorise enemies and impress and co-opt new recruits. IS adheres to a doctrine of total war without limits and constraints....

davidbfpo
09-09-2014, 11:57 PM
Clint Watts of FPRI has a commentary, the full title being 'The U.S. Can’t Destroy ISIS, Only ISIS Can Destroy ISIS – The Unfortunate Merits of the “Let Them Rot” Strategy' and draws upon the Algerian 'lessons learnt':http://www.fpri.org/geopoliticus/2014/09/us-cant-destroy-isis-only-isis-can-destroy-isis-unfortunate-merits-let-them-rot-strategy#

Given the hype in the media, some of which surely comes from within governments, I hazard that patience and following such an option is overwhelmed by those who advocate "tough action" and defeating ISIS. As if 'shock & awe' works against an insurgency.

davidbfpo
09-10-2014, 09:44 PM
I read this 'Think Progress' story today and wondered if the SWC community was aware of the book behind the title 'The Book That Really Explains ISIS (Hint: It's Not The Quran' and there is a thread, with two posts in 2007 about the book 'The Management of Savagery':http://thinkprogress.org/world/2014/09/10/3565635/the-book-that-really-explains-isis-hint-its-not-the-quran/

From the story:
... there is some evidence to suggest that ISIS’s overarching strategy is especially influenced by one book in particular — and no, it’s not the Qur’an.


In 2004, a PDF of a book entitled “The Management Of Savagery (http://azelin.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/abu-bakr-naji-the-management-of-savagery-the-most-critical-stage-through-which-the-umma-will-pass.pdf)” was posted online and circulated among Sunni jihadist circles. Scholars soon noticed that the book, which was published by an unknown author writing under the pseudonym “Abu Bakr Naji,” had become popular among many extremist groups such as al-Shabaab in Somalia, and was eventually translated into English for study in 2006 by William McCants, now the director of the Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World at the Brookings Institution. The book, McCants told ThinkProgress, was written as an alternative to the decentralized, “leaderless” approach to jihadism popular in the mid-2000s. Instead of using isolated attacks on super powers all over the globe, “The Management Of Savagery” offered an expansive plan for how a group of Muslim militants could violently seize land and establish their own self-governing Islamic state — much like ISIS is trying to do today.

davidbfpo
09-14-2014, 09:30 PM
Carrying out beheadings and other extreme acts is unthinkable for most people, but the right cocktail of factors can make anyone an extremist, says neuroscientist Prof Ian Robertson

Link:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/11041338/The-science-behind-Isils-savagery.html

davidbfpo
09-17-2014, 03:44 PM
An analysis 'The Islamic State’s Vulnerability' by:
Daveed Gartenstein-Ross is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and an adjunct assistant professor in Georgetown University's security studies program.

Link:http://warontherocks.com/2014/09/the-islamic-states-vulnerability/#_

He ends with:
The Islamic State’s many weaknesses will soon become apparent, if they aren’t already. This doesn’t mean that the group will inevitably collapse; and even if it does, its collapse might just mean that its fighters are driven back into the hands of an old familiar foe, al-Qaeda, or other Syrian and Iraqi non-state actors. The United States should approach this fight strategically, understanding both the Islamic State’s weaknesses and also the broader context of the fight.

Granite_State
09-18-2014, 03:05 AM
Bill Lind's latest (I know he has both detractors and diehards here at SWC):

https://www.traditionalright.com/the-view-from-olympus-d-o-a/


The LAR footnote is an interesting thought experiment, at the least:


A long footnote: In my last column, I noted that the Pentagon should be able to give the pesident the option of sending a small, competent, fast-moving ground force that could rout ISIS in a campaign of days, or, at most, weeks. In theory this force exists, in the form of three Marine Corps Light Armored Vehicle (LAV) battalions. The original concept behind the LAV (I know because I am one of the three people who, as a staffer to Senator Gary Hart, initiated the LAV program; the other two were a Senate Armed Services Committee staffer, Steve Dotson, and a Marine one-star named Al Gray) was to create one or more LAV regiments that could serve as Soviet-style Operations Maneuver Groups in third-world situations. Only once in the 25-plus years since have the LAV battalions been used this way, when they were grouped for an operational advance on Tikrit immediately after the fall of Baghdad. We should not go in on the ground against ISIS, but should the president decide to do so, that would be the way to do it. It would require a commander who knows operational art from pachinko, of which we have very few. But one who could easily do it is Marine four-star General John Kelly. By putting a four-star in charge, the Pentagon would ensure the LAV operational maneuver group got support when it needed it. Pitting regular light cavalry against irregular light cavalry in a campaign of rapid maneuver, the regulars should easily come out on top, if only because their skill at techniques should be much higher. Of course, if the president were to ask the Pentagon for this option, it would immediately say it is impossible, because a success by a small, fast force using maneuver warfare would not justify larger budgets and force structures. At senior levels, the budget war is the only war that matters.

davidbfpo
09-25-2014, 03:14 PM
Two contributions to assessing ISIS. First this in the NYT 'ISIS’ Harsh Brand of Islam Is Rooted in Austere Saudi Creed' and looks at the theological or ideological aspects.

Link:http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/09/25/world/middleeast/isis-abu-bakr-baghdadi-caliph-wahhabi.html?referrer=

The second is an email based exchange between SME, with the title 'Around the Halls: What is ISIS' Strategy?' hosted by Brookings:http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/iran-at-saban/posts/2014/09/24-around-the-halls-isis-strategy

The final comment by Charles Lister is a good read, especially on the reaction of 'moderate' Syrian groups - hardly encouraging.

davidbfpo
10-02-2014, 12:53 PM
A reasonable check list on The American Conservative, by former DoS "whistle blower" Peter van Buren:
A guide to the spin, empty gestures, and behind-the-scene players that will determine the fate of America's re-entry into Iraq.

Link:A guide to the spin, empty gestures, and behind-the-scene players that will determine the fate of America's re-entry into Iraq. (http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/A guide to the spin, empty gestures, and behind-the-scene players that will determine the fate of America's re-entry into Iraq.)

Elsewhere I've read comments by ret'd US military leaders that it will take up to three years to rebuild the Iraqi state forces and the FT has an excellent article (behind a reistration wall) using the fall of an army base as an illustration:http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/ceb48014-494f-11e4-9d7e-00144feab7de.html#axzz3EoJ2hviA

AmericanPride
10-02-2014, 11:06 PM
ISIS reportedly has a powerful social media component. How much of that is driven by disaffected (or bored) wealthy sympathizers or their youth in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere? One of the things that strikes me about Saudi Arabia is that their analogy of the youth living in their mother's basement is actually quite widespread - except their youth are much more socially isolated but by virtue of their wealth have virtually unlimited access to social media.

CrowBat
10-02-2014, 11:37 PM
I can't say where the 'youth' or 'wealthy sympathizers' (in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere) are living, or if they are disaffected or simply bored. But, from monitoring several Arab forums that are (at least in theory) dedicated to 'defence'-related issues, I would say there are indeed a lot of them. And some of them are actually serving (whether in Saudi or in other of local militaries).

Although some of moderators are - time and again - trying to curb corresponding activity (i.e. postings with pro-Daesh content), most of the times they're letting them do, and the 'sympathizers' are returning and posting their stuff. Alternatively, they're posting derogatory remarks on activity of US and allied militaries, like LOLs about RAF Tornados returning from a mission over Iraq without firing a single shot, two nights ago; or, congratulations for Daesh claim to have shot down one of French Rafales during their first sortie over Iraq (apparently related to the extremists actually downing one of Iraqi UAVs).


One of the things that strikes me about Saudi Arabia is that their analogy of the youth living in their mother's basement is actually quite widespread - except their youth are much more socially isolated but by virtue of their wealth have virtually unlimited access to social media.
One of bizzare issues about the Saudi society is that marriages got extremely expensive: even quite wealthy families simply can't afford them. Major reason is that brides are going at very high prices, literally.

That said, there is plenty of 'clandestine socializing' (outside, though with help of social media), while the amount of access to the social media is actually much more curbed (by security authorities) than usually thought.

For example, it's easier to arrange a (clandestine/private, of course) meeting by driving your car - slowly, very slowly - around some mal with semi-opened windows, so the girls can drop their 'business cards' with telephone numbers, then via the social media. Something similar can be said about the ways Saudi atheists are arranging their meetings too (being an atheist is worse than being a non-Moslem in Saudi Arabia).

I would say that plenty of activity related to supporting extremists is taking place in similar fashion too.

davidbfpo
10-03-2014, 02:38 PM
A short,, thoughtful article by Alireza Doostdar, an Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies and the Anthropology of Religion at the University of Chicago Divinity School:https://divinity.uchicago.edu/sightings/how-not-understand-isis-alireza-doostdar

A few passages:
We see ISIS as a unitary entity because ISIS propagandists want us to see it that way. This is why it is problematic to rely on doctrines espoused in propaganda to explain ISIS’ behavior....Focusing on doctrinal statements would have us homogenizing the entirety of ISIS’ military force as fighters motivated by an austere and virulent form of Salafi Islam. This is how ISIS wants us to see things, and it is often the view propagated by mainstream media.... But ISIS emerged from the fires of war, occupation, killing, torture, and disenfranchisement. It did not need to sell its doctrine to win recruits. It needed above all to prove itself effective against its foes.

davidbfpo
10-07-2014, 11:48 PM
Ahmed Rashid has a short review of the impact of ISIS in Afghanistan and Pakistan:http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2014/oct/06/allure-isis/

He ends with:
If the war in Afghanistan drags on without a decisive victory or a political solution, the danger grows that younger Taliban will become more attracted to ISIS. And the possibility of ISIS wielding growing influence among the Pakistani or Afghan Taliban is heightened by the generational shift taking place among the Taliban themselves.

Unless Pakistan and Afghanistan are able to quickly end the extremism by Taliban groups that has plagued them for years they are likely to find themselves facing a far more militarized, radicalized, and extremist youth movement. The danger then is that these countries could find themselves ceding major territory to extremist groups, in a repeat of what ISIS has done in Iraq and Syria.

davidbfpo
10-20-2014, 09:48 PM
A fascinating article, the headline 'The Making of the World's Scariest Terrorist Brand', although the sub-title is quite telling:
ISIS mixes new-media savvy with medieval savagery. It’s a diabolical marketing strategy that led us right back into war—and one that future terror groups will surely copycat. Or try to top.

Link:https://medium.com/matter/the-making-of-the-worlds-most-effective-terrorist-brand-92620f91bc9d

It ends with:
We can bomb them one truck, one convoy, one Levant at a time. But even if the Islamic State is scoured from the face of the Earth, no future terrorist army will forget its media. Its innovations in branding and marketing will live on, only imprinted with different logos, different actors. After all, it’s just an ad campaign. Just a bloody ad campaign. And we’re buying.

davidbfpo
10-25-2014, 07:56 PM
An interesting, pessimistic assessment of the two component parts of ISIS from The Soufan Group:http://soufangroup.com/tsg-intelbrief-from-bucca-to-kobani-the-hybrid-ideology-of-the-islamic-state/


IS is now a chimera of Ba’athist and takfiri ideologies, with the organizational skills of the former helping channel the motivational fervor of the latter. The result is an extremist group unlike any other. It’s the merging of Usama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein (http://soufangroup.com/tsg-intelbrief-in-saddams-footsteps-islamic-states-tactics-of-violence/), with the strengths of one helping negate the weaknesses of the other.

davidbfpo
10-27-2014, 04:43 PM
Will McCants (Brookings) explains the motivation of both Sunni and Shi‘a fighters drawn to the Levant battlefield by a common apocalyptic belief:
They fight in the vanguard of the Mahdi, the Muslim savior whom the Prophet Muhammad prophesied would appear in the Levant (the coastal Mediterranean region that includes Syria and Lebanon) at the End of Days to wage a final great battle against the infidels’ armies.

(Later) With the entry of the United States into the field, jihadis anticipate that the ultimate showdown in Dabiq is drawing ever closer. One might expect that the recent entry of infidel armies into Iraq and Syria would lessen the internecine tone of the prophesying and focus attention on the Mahdi’s battle with the infidels. But it has only heightened the sectarian apocalyptic fervor as each sect vies to destroy the other for the privilege of destroying the infidels.

Link:http://www.lawfareblog.com/2014/10/the-foreign-policy-essay-the-sectarian-apocalypse/

I have heard Muslims explain this, but Will's explanation is best.

omarali50
10-27-2014, 08:09 PM
The Quran has little or nothing to say about the end times (it has a lot to say about the day of judgement and the events of that day, but no details about the times preceding that final day), so Muslim versions of the last days and the battles between the Mahdi and the anti-Christ are based almost entirely on hadith literature, written 200 plus years after the advent of Islam and obviously drawing heavily on Christian sources. While the final confrontations are all in the Levant, the advent of the Mahdi is said (in some hadiths) to be in Khorasan.
http://dailyhadith.adaptivesolutionsinc.com/hadith/Black-Flags-from-Khorasan-are-Mahdi%E2%80%99s.htm
Because of this, the Taliban and various Pakistani sponsored Jihadist groups like to believe they are the warriors who will break out of the mountain passes from Khorasan (Central Asia/North-eastern Iran) with the Mahdi among them.
Cynics suspect that the Khorasan hadiths were mostly concocted by the Abbassids to give religious legitimacy to their (central Asian led) revolt against the Ummayad Caliphate (and of course, Abu Muslim and his Central Asian armies carried black banners).
Cynics have a lot of fun things to say about the whole topic ;)

davidbfpo
10-28-2014, 09:47 PM
Judge for yourself this Q&A on Der Spiegel:http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/islamic-state-interview-with-an-extremist-recruiter-a-999557.html#ref=nl-international

Compost
10-29-2014, 01:43 AM
Mindset often determines a choice of words. For example pseudo progressives and fellow travellers are especially fond of referring to peoples parties and to liberation.

Rational humans are expected to use less colourful names and terminology but sometimes fail to do so. That is aggravated by the would-be popular media which invariably includes some who will jump on any bandwagon. One result today is the fairly commonplace use of the term ISIS. More appropriate would be IF for Islamic Fascists or interchangeably Islamist Fascism, and IS referring to in Syria.

Hence IFIS in Syria but IFII in Iraq. IFII sounds appropriate even though some might suppose it refers to Yemen. And IFII seems doubly appropriate because swarming as a form of auftragtaktik is unlikely to succeed at the operational level of conflict.

davidbfpo
10-29-2014, 12:05 PM
Just landed here is a sixty page Soufan Group report on ISIS, the chief author being ex-SIS & UN official Richard Barrett:http://soufangroup.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/TSG-The-Islamic-State-Nov14.pdf

davidbfpo
10-30-2014, 04:28 PM
Watched an excellent, disturbing PBS Frontline documentary today 'The Rise of ISIS', a curious mix of American and Iraqi "talking heads" alongside film footage:http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/rise-of-isis/

At one point Ali Soufan comments that killing comes before religion for ISIS.

Note the documentary does not comment on how to respond to ISIS.

Bill Moore
10-30-2014, 07:19 PM
Now that I know you can see these Britain I may post more of the Frontline and Nova specials, they're very well done. I watched this one a couple of nights ago (made the time).

Despite being well done it presented little new for those who followed the situation. It did a great job of pointing out how extensively Maliki and his cronies abused the Sunnis. This started when we there, and after we left it apparently got worse. He dug his own grave, and unfortunately many of our nations have one foot in that grave also. We have an amazing talent for backing the wrong guy over and over again.

omarali50
10-31-2014, 04:33 PM
The frontline documentary was good, but there were a couple of blind spots. For example, at some points they seemed to imply that if the US had "done more for the FSA", things would have been different. That seems a wildly exaggerated or mistaken view of things. The US decision to try and bring down the murderous and thuggish Assad regime was a terrible decision and adding a few piddling billions to it could not possibly have made any difference. Vast areas of Syria were abandoned early on by the Assad regime. There was no significant Assad military threat there. With or without US weapons, what stopped FSA from effectively establishing a government there? Is there ANY place where the FSA has set up a statelet that is NOT infested with Islamic militants and that can effectively maintain monopoly of violence? None as far as a distant observer can see.
The real problem is not whether weapons were given or not. The real problem is the penetration of superficial and mistaken assumptions in the highest echelons of the US govt. And Obama is NOT the one who is most crazy. At least he seems to have the vague notion that people had better do their own part before asking for vast US armies to step in and do the fighting for them.
Absence of the state is the worst of many bad options. But states can be held responsible for their foreign actions and for hosting terrorist groups. Less so for domestic oppression. Unfortunately.
First, do no harm...

CrowBat
10-31-2014, 07:10 PM
The frontline documentary was good, but there were a couple of blind spots. For example, at some points they seemed to imply that if the US had "done more for the FSA", things would have been different. That seems a wildly exaggerated or mistaken view of things. The US decision to try and bring down the murderous and thuggish Assad regime was a terrible decision and adding a few piddling billions to it could not possibly have made any difference. Vast areas of Syria were abandoned early on by the Assad regime. There was no significant Assad military threat there. With or without US weapons, what stopped FSA from effectively establishing a government there?Lack of money and arms.


Is there ANY place where the FSA has set up a statelet that is NOT infested with Islamic militants and that can effectively maintain monopoly of violence? None as far as a distant observer can see.Then ask the JAN why is it presently assaulting SRF-controlled areas of Idlib province?

Alternativelly, check who is holding all of insurgent-controlled parts of Aleppo.


The real problem is not whether weapons were given or not. The real problem is the penetration of superficial and mistaken assumptions in the highest echelons of the US govt. And Obama is NOT the one who is most crazy. At least he seems to have the vague notion that people had better do their own part...And who was protesting all over Syria through 2011 and first half of 2012? Who did the fighting ever since?

Hand at heart: don't you find it absurd to state something as silly as 'Syrians are not doing their own part', while their insurgents are not only fighting the regime - which is superior in fire-power - plus the IRGC, Hezbollah and 'few other foreign militias', plus the Daesh, and all of this at the same time (and that since three years, meanwhile)...?


...before asking for vast US armies to step in and do the fighting for them.Nobody has ever asked for 'vast US armies'.


Absence of the state is the worst of many bad options.Nobody demanded destruction of the state of Syria. Just an end of Assadist dictatorship.


But states can be held responsible for their foreign actions and for hosting terrorist groups.What kind of problem is then preventing the USA (and West) from holding a terrorist-supporting regime of Assadists for accountable for surviving with help of terror of its own thugs and terrorist organizations like the IRGC, Hezbollah, PFLP etc., etc., etc.?

davidbfpo
10-31-2014, 07:39 PM
Mindset often determines a choice of words. For example pseudo progressives and fellow travellers are especially fond of referring to peoples parties and to liberation.

Rational humans are expected to use less colourful names and terminology but sometimes fail to do so. That is aggravated by the would-be popular media which invariably includes some who will jump on any bandwagon. One result today is the fairly commonplace use of the term ISIS. More appropriate would be IF for Islamic Fascists or interchangeably Islamist Fascism, and IS referring to in Syria.

Hence IFIS in Syria but IFII in Iraq. IFII sounds appropriate even though some might suppose it refers to Yemen. And IFII seems doubly appropriate because swarming as a form of auftragtaktik is unlikely to succeed at the operational level of conflict.

The answer:
The term “Daesh” is strategically a better choice because it is still accurate in that it spells out the acronym of the group’s full Arabic name, al-Dawla al-Islamiya fi al-Iraq wa al-Sham. Yet, at the same time, “Daesh” can also be understood as a play on words — and an insult. Depending on how it is conjugated in Arabic, it can mean anything from “to trample down and crush” to “a bigot who imposes his view on others.”

Longer explanation:http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/10/09/words-matter-isis-war-use-daesh/V85GYEuasEEJgrUun0dMUP/story.html

Compost
10-31-2014, 09:17 PM
The answer:

Longer explanation:http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/10/09/words-matter-isis-war-use-daesh/V85GYEuasEEJgrUun0dMUP/story.html
Daesh could be preferred. However it would continue the use of an opponent’s terminology. Also it would not be readily understood by its intended english-speaking audience unless alternatively expanded as ‘ death and extremist shock horror ’ or suchlike.

Continuing my form of bigotry, perhaps IRIS and IRII for Islamic Radicals etc.

CrowBat
11-01-2014, 07:58 AM
IF, IRIS, IRII etc. - all of these are or would be Western creations.

These idiots consider 'Daesh' - which is the way most of Syrians and Iraqis call them - for an insult, and that's perfectly fine with me.

AmericanPride
11-02-2014, 02:01 PM
Nobody demanded destruction of the state of Syria. Just an end of Assadist dictatorship.

This is a good point. American discourse seems to assume that 'state-building' first requires state-destroying.

Bill Moore
11-02-2014, 02:22 PM
This is a good point. American discourse seems to assume that 'state-building' first requires state-destroying.

Do you mean de-Bathistication? Dor you mean replacing their former of government? Rewriting their constitution? Rewickering their economic system? Would we really do any of these things?

davidbfpo
11-02-2014, 02:29 PM
An Arab website has this interesting analysis, it is in English:

Starts with:
A careful and specialized examination of the strengths and weaknesses of the fighting doctrine and the military performance of suicidal salafi jihadi groups, such as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), is yet to be done. Such a study has not been carried out by official military authorities in countries directly affected, such as Iraq and Syria, or by scholars specialized in studying these groups. Nevertheless, it is possible to review some of the information on the issue found in different publications.Note the emphasis on "technicals" and the aggressive use of snipers.

Citing Justin Bronk, a RUSI analyst:
A particular speciality is outflanking defensive positions and then mopping up defenders who attempt to retreat. The tactic is as much psychological as it is kinetic, and is greatly magnified by the horrendous and public brutality ISIS has systematically exhibited wherever it has gained control.Link:http://english.al-akhbar.com/content/isis%E2%80%99-fighting-doctrine-sorting-fact-fiction

Link to the article by Justin Bronk, written two weeks ago:http://edition.cnn.com/2014/10/17/opinion/bronk-isis-guerillas/index.html

davidbfpo
11-14-2014, 05:05 PM
A pithy commentary by John Schindler of the US strategy and approach to countering Daesh / ISIS. Try this:
To be blunt, we kill very effectively but we have precious little understanding of how to transform Muslim societies by force.

Link:http://20committee.com/2014/11/14/why-the-islamic-state-is-winning/

Here are some tasters:
The U.S. military is quite capable of defeating almost any adversary on the battlefield, even Da’ish, though that is not the same thing as producing lasting political outcomes that Americans will like. This is particularly true in the Greater Middle East, where the politico-cultural barriers to Westernization delivered by the barrel of a gun are steep and strong.

It is now time, indeed long overdue, to dispense with magical thinking about what the application of American military power might achieve in any lasting strategic or political sense in the Middle East.

I'd forgotten the Italian pacification of Libya (1928-1932):http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacification_of_Libya

Which today is not an option for the USA or its allies.

Yes there is a thread 'Watching ISIS' into which this will be merged one day. It is worth a thread to alert readers and perhaps respond.

Finally:
A necessary first step is having a genuine debate about what our military can — and cannot — achieve in Iraq and Syria.

Bill Moore
11-14-2014, 05:58 PM
A pithy commentary by John Schindler of the US strategy and approach to countering Daesh / ISIS. Try this

Link:http://20committee.com/2014/11/14/why-the-islamic-state-is-winning/


The “COIN” agenda proved effective at promoting the careers and fortunes of some U.S. Army officers and their think-tank hangers-on, yet quite ineffective at producing strategic victory. It is now time, indeed long overdue, to dispense with magical thinking about what the application of American military power might achieve in any lasting strategic or political sense in the Middle East.Many of us concur with the author's assessment above. Those of us who tend to agree, also tend to believe that doing COIN for another 10 years wouldn't produce results that are more sustainable than we have today. Doing COIN for another 10 years would do the following: tie our forces down for 10 years, bleed us out economically, and cause us to forfeit higher priority strategic objectives around the globe. That doesn't mean we throw out hard learned lessons about COIN over the past decade, because we will certainly need those lessons in the future. There are elements in our COIN doctrine worth retaining, but our strategic approach to COIN needs a serious relook. The key is to develop realistic policy objectives that advance our interests, and not develop objectives that are beyond our capabilities to achieve.


To be blunt, we kill very effectively but we have precious little understanding of how to transform Muslim societies by force. Indeed, our efforts in that direction usually produce opposite outcomes, which should be easily predictable were we not besotted by lies about how others view us and what we seek to achieve. In Iraq and Afghanistan our desired goals were to ultimately transform their societies. Obviously we didn't want to put another Saddam or Taliban government back in charge. However, that doesn't mean we had to pursue the neocon view of the world, which is that everyone desires to be like us. We just have to remove the evil forces that are preventing them from doing so. It is clear many people in Iraq and Afghanistan desired something different/better than Saddam and the Taliban, and the more educated may have even desired to move closer to a Western model, but they didn't speak for the masses. We took transformation to the extreme and tried to impose democracy by force. On top of that, we tried to do it on the cheap. The democracy we imposed was little more than mob rule, resulting in continued instability that created the conditions for extremism to grow in Iraq, and return in Afghanistan.

Realizing we over reached is insufficient if we're going to be successful in the future. There must be more salient lessons that we should take from these gallant efforts for the future. Clearly our opposite approach of hands off in Libya didn't fare so well, so is there a middle path that is feasible? In hindsight, what would have been reasonable goals in Afghanistan that would have advanced our interests in the region?

I believe we still think big and pursue grand visions, but we need to slow our roll and accept change takes time, and it will manifest differently in each country. Sustainable change must come from within, it can't be imposed by outsiders. We have this throughout history when Western colonies fought for their freedom, and Eastern European countries were freed from the grasp of the USSR, etc. Imposed change does not endure.

The first feasible step after the fighting is over is to establish order, and that doesn't mean imposing a foreign form of governance, especially a complex democratic government. Putting a strong man in charge is more humane than years of continual factional bloodshed. Then help government and society evolve over time by developing their human capital and other forms of development. Let them see what we and others do, then they'll pick and choose what they want to adapt as their way over time.


Simply put, we have no ability to change Muslim societies unless we are willing to stay the long haul and are eager to kill staggering numbers of people, many of them civilians, in horrible ways.It is extremely arrogant of us to assume that Muslims would us to transform them anymore than we want Muslims to transform our society. Do we think the only way to achieve our ends is transforming their society? It is time for a complete relook of our approach. Until we develop a strategy that advances our interests, we should become comfortable with the unpleasant fact hat killing those who intend to harm us is a pragmatic course of action. It is not one we should shy away from, but also remaining cognizant that there may be a better way and we should continue to work on determining what that may be.

davidbfpo
11-19-2014, 05:36 PM
A useful BBC summary 'How serious is the IS threat to the UK?' and covers the apparent media success enjoyed by Daesh (ISIS):http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-30080004

Well illustrated by this picture, which I assumed it adapted from the popular video game:http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/78107000/jpg/_78107215_isis-call-of-duty-poster.jpg

davidbfpo
11-28-2014, 11:20 AM
A long 80 pg report by the Israeli NGO, the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, on ISIS; which I have quickly skimmed in part:http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/Data/articles/Art_20733/E_101_14_163836165.pdf

davidbfpo
12-03-2014, 12:14 PM
A WaPo article 'Paranoia could be the best weapon against the Islamic State' by David Ignatius; note Clint Watss advocated this option awhile ago. Nothing stratling, but I expect david is read more inside 'The Beltway':http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/david-ignatius-paranoia-could-be-the-best-weapon-against-the-islamic-state/2014/12/02/771de21e-7a5f-11e4-9a27-6fdbc612bff8_story.html

davidbfpo
12-03-2014, 12:16 PM
Charles Lister from Brookings, has a new paper 'Profiling the islamic State':http://www.brookings.edu/research/reports2/2014/12/profiling-islamic-state-lister

From the summary:
In a new Brookings Doha Center Analysis Paper, Charles Lister traces IS’s roots from Jordan to Afghanistan, and finally to Iraq and Syria. He describes its evolution from a small terrorist group into a bureaucratic organization that currently controls thousands of square miles and is attempting to govern millions of people. Lister assesses the group’s capabilities, explains its various tactics, and identifies its likely trajectory.

davidbfpo
12-03-2014, 04:55 PM
Two very different commentaries on the situation. First Ahmed Rashid in NY Review of Books, with a short overview 'ISIS: What the US Doesn’t Understand':http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2014/dec/02/isis-what-us-doesnt-understand/

Secondly and rather beatedly as it appeared in mid-October, Reueul Gerecht in The Standard, has a long piece on the entire region 'Sandstorm: The Middle East in chaos' and his focus is on motivation. A sample:
Today, no Muslim state in the Middle East has an asabiyya (asabiyya, which is perhaps best translated as esprit de corps mixed with the will to power) that peacefully and happily binds its citizens together. Unless new organizing ideas are embraced, we are likely to see the persistence of the Islamic militancy that has shaken the region. The prognosis isn’t good, in part because of highly counterproductive American actions.
Link:http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/sandstorm_808491.html?page=1

davidbfpo
12-05-2014, 11:09 AM
A German report by Die Zeit (paper) and ARD (TV), which aims to:
The goal was to find out exactly how the group works, where its money comes from and who is profiting. We wanted to find out how successful IS really is.
Link:http://www.zeit.de/feature/islamic-state-is-caliphate

Business crosses frontlines and reaches beyond:
The oil is sold down a long chain of middlemen in ever-smaller batches. Criminal bands, tribes, corrupt civil servants, Shiites, Sunnis, Kurds and Turkmen: People from all parts of society seem to be involved. The end users are in the Kurdish regions of Iraq or Syria, in Iran or in Turkey...

(Later) Yet the more unbearable the situation becomes, the greater the risk of revolt will be. At the moment, it is brute force that is holding this caliphate together – not faith in God and certainly not "love and patience." And it is theft that is filling IS coffers, not any kind of functioning economy. The caliphate is unsustainable.

davidbfpo
12-05-2014, 05:17 PM
From ISW:http://iswiraq.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/isis-sanctuary-map-december-5-2014.html
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CFTUDGQDmj4/VIHJiy3sMhI/AAAAAAAACRc/6tIkwX23UE0/s1600/ISIS%2BMap%2BDEC%2B5.png

davidbfpo
12-21-2014, 03:40 PM
The Israeli NGO, the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center, has now published their entire report in English 'ISIS: Portrait of a Jihadi Terrorist Organization', with 264 pgs:http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/Data/articles/Art_20733/101_14_Ef_1329270214.pdf

davidbfpo
12-23-2014, 05:39 PM
In a joint investigation TRAC and the Quillaim Foundation take apart a recent Daesh video of a group execution - all is not what it seems. Shadows added for example and the time track shows gaps.

From TRAC's introduction:
Since its inception, the Islamic State (IS) propaganda machine has repeatedly demonstrated its sophistication and complexity. IS has abandoned the often ramshackle methods of international outreach common to its rivals (e.g. bin Laden's cassette tapes) in favor of meticulously planned, high-quality videos. In one of its most recent releases, Although the Disbelievers Dislike It, IS attempts to provide a graphic cinema-quality experience to its viewers. Nevertheless, upon close examination, it becomes apparent that discrepancies were overlooked in the editorial process, leading to telling anomalies.

There is a video on the TRAC site, which will be graphic.

Link to TRAC:http://www.trackingterrorism.org/article/detailed-analysis-islamic-state-isis-video-although-unbelievers-dislike-it-story-expansion-0

Link to Quilliam, which is a PDF report (no video, just photos):http://www.quilliamfoundation.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/publications/free/detailed-analysis-of-islamic-state-propaganda-video.pdf

One wonders how such a forensic, if not technical analysis can be exploited within the areas Daesh control, shown to those who watch such videos on their radicalisation route and as evidence to support a war crime investigation.

davidbfpo
01-12-2015, 07:28 PM
A BBC analysis by Professor Fawaz Gerges, of LSE, on the BBC which aims to:
To make sense of the sudden rise of Islamic State (IS) and its territorial gains in Iraq and Syria, it is important to place the organisation within the broader global jihadist movement.
Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-30681224

davidbfpo
01-24-2015, 04:47 PM
Professor Scott Lucas has a commentary:https://www.opendemocracy.net/open-security/scott-lucas/why-fight-against-islamic-state-is-not-success-we%27re-told-it-is

It starts with:
Is John Kerry right to be so gung-ho about military successes against Islamic State? Not really—as the fundamental political challenges in Iraq and Syria remain unaddressed.

As he notes where is there progress, excluding the increasing Iranian influence, if not power:
The blunt reality is that, with the exception of Kobanê, there can be no effective campaign against IS without the support of a local ground force.

What is needed? Well it is not SOF and bombing, that is just about containing the Daesh. He advocates:
There are alternatives that could really challenge IS: an Iraqi Kurdistan with real international recognition and support, an Iraqi government answering to all communities, a Syrian opposition supported in a political vision that overcomes not only the jihadists but the Assad regime.

Bill Moore
01-24-2015, 06:05 PM
There are alternatives that could really challenge IS: an Iraqi Kurdistan with real international recognition and support, an Iraqi government answering to all communities, a Syrian opposition supported in a political vision that overcomes not only the jihadists but the Assad regime.

Of course these would be preferred solutions, and the U.S. and others are not neglecting them by choice as this academic seems to imply, the U.S. is neglecting them because they're not in the realm of the possible at this time.

Who is the future leader in Iraq right now that is considered legitimate by all sides?

What future leader in Syria can calm troubled waters?

I'm not sure how a Kurdistan at this time would create stability. Furthermore, one report (can't confirm its validity) indicates that Kurds' relatively poor performance against ISIL as dissuaded them from pursuing statehood at this time, because they realize they're not ready for it.

Academics at times, can be rather annoying when they pretend to offer pseudo-intellectual solutions that have no basis in reality. They seem to say please listen to me you dumb governments, as I'm a PhD and much wiser than you. On the hand, "The Wisdom of Crowds" argues that experts more often than not get it wrong.

davidbfpo
01-25-2015, 10:18 AM
In August 2014 MG Nagata, Centcom SOF commander, stated 'We do not understand the movement...'. Well there is a book coming that aims to do so. The linked article gives a glimpse into ISIS:http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/25/inside-isis-training-camps?

The article is worth reading, the sub-title is shorter:
We reveal how the terror group recruits and retains its members through zealotry, rhetoric and obscure theologyBack to MG Nagata:
We do not understand the movement, and until we do, we are not going to defeat it We have not defeated the idea. We do not even understand the ideaa...There is a magnetic attraction to IS that is bringing in resources, talent, weapons, etc., to thicken, harden, embolden IS in ways that are very alarming.
Link:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2890266/We-not-understand-movement-Special-Forces-general-confessed-clueless-ISIS-FBI-agent-warns-terror-army-s-youth-recruiting.html

The book is due to be published February 17th 2015. From:http://www.amazon.com/ISIS-Inside-Terror-Michael-Weiss/dp/1941393578

In the UK:http://www.amazon.co.uk/Isis-Inside-Terror-Michael-Weiss/dp/1941393578

AdamG
01-25-2015, 05:17 PM
A dozen former French soldiers, mostly from special forces and the Foreign Legion, have joined jihadists fighting in Syria and Iraq, a defense ministry source confirms, as the government readies a new multimillion anti-terror plan.

http://rt.com/news/224983-french-military-become-jihadists/

davidbfpo
01-25-2015, 09:08 PM
A useful, long article on Daesh rules Raqqa, Syria:http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2015/feb/05/how-isis-rules/

Interesting to note as those Syrians who can leave go they appear to be replaced by others - many of them not Syrians. For one observer:
ISIS was rapidly becoming the only option for Sunnis in Syria who didn’t want to reconcile with the regime. ISIS may be failing in its attempt to govern, but for such people there is nothing else in sight.

davidbfpo
01-25-2015, 09:14 PM
AdamG,

There are infrequent reports on Westerners going to fight alongside the Kurds too. A month ago two ex-UK soldiers were id'd and interviewed & released upon their return at Xmas. Today an Australian local politician has gone (Australian law forbids any citizen fighting abroad).

With the reported success of the opposition (kurds & FSA) in the Kobane pocket, it is easy to think the Kurdish diaspora - mainly in Western Europe, outside the region - may despatch volunteers.

JWing
01-27-2015, 03:20 PM
Fighting and Coalition air strikes are beginning to take their toll on IS's leadership. Baghdadi's two top lieutenants among growing list of top leadership being killed degrading ability of IS to govern and carry out military operations. Read more here (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-islamic-states-leadership-losses-in.html).

Bill Moore
01-27-2015, 09:17 PM
Fighting and Coalition air strikes are beginning to take their toll on IS's leadership. Baghdadi's two top lieutenants among growing list of top leadership being killed degrading ability of IS to govern and carry out military operations. Read more here (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-islamic-states-leadership-losses-in.html).

Pardon my suspicions that this analysis may be overly optimistic. I recall hearing similar reports of we're winning since 9/11, and no doubt tactically we were. Over time those victories seem to have dissipated. I suspect ISIL will morph into something else that is less vulnerable to our air strikes, but we'll just have to wait and see.

OUTLAW 09
01-28-2015, 10:59 AM
Iraq officials vow to investigate alleged massacre of Sunnis during a government campaign to seize control of Diyala
http://fw.to/oqFsQEa

Kind of late if you ask me as the media has long carried this reported massacre and placed it on the Shia militias.

Bill Moore
01-30-2015, 12:54 AM
For those following the news on the Jordanian pilot captured by ISIL/IS it is clear that Jordan's military support to our coalition has little popular support with the people of Jordan. They are putting a lot of pressure on their government to swap prisoners. Jordan said they were ready for a deal if ISIL could produce proof of life.

Not surprisingly this demonstrates that our coalition isn't as strong as projected by the media. A possible fissure between the U.S. and Jordanian relationship regarding ISIL, recent threats by ISIL to attack Saudi, and the LH rocket attack on Israel combined has certainly heightened tensions and uncertainty in the region.

ISIL's advance may have halted in Iraq, but they are still very much a strategic influence in the region. We may very well be looking at different picture in the Middle East within the next 30 days.

OUTLAW 09
01-30-2015, 11:29 AM
UK research center is estimating on the low side that a total of 20,720 foreign fighters have streamed into Syria and Iraq and now are higher in numbers than during the jihadi stream at the height of the Russian AFG war

Numbers do not seem to be dropping and their research is indicating they are all not social misfits/rejects but well educated and young.

Link:http://icsr.info/2015/01/foreign-fighter-total-syriairaq-now-exceeds-20000-surpasses-afghanistan-conflict-1980s/

davidbfpo
01-31-2015, 09:42 PM
A review article by ICSR's Aaron Zelin that compares the 'wilayat' strategy of Daesh (ISIS) and the 'franchise' model used by AQ. Alongside a quick summary of what is happening where jihadists operate.
Link:http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2015/01/28/the-islamic-states-model/

His article was presented at a POMEPS conference this month alongside three others see:http://pomeps.org/2015/01/27/islamist-politics-in-the-shadow-of-the-islamic-state-memos/

“Jihadi-Salafi views of the Islamic State (http://pomeps.org/2015/01/27/jihadi-salafi-views-of-the-islamic-state/),” by Joas Wagemakers, Radboud University Nijmegen
“Brotherhood activism and regime consolidation in Egypt (http://pomeps.org/2015/01/29/brotherhood-activism-and-regime-consolidation-in-egypt/), ” by Steven Brooke, University of Texas at Austin
“The ISIS-ification of Islamist politics (http://pomeps.org/2015/01/30/the-isis-ification-of-islamist-politics/),” by Khalil al-Anani, George Washington University and John’s Hopkins University SAIS

davidbfpo
02-03-2015, 09:42 PM
Professor Landis has an extensive review of ISIS:Inside the Army of Terrorand he starts with:
Overall, this book ably accomplishes the task in a concise manner, and is a valuable, compelling read for anyone- general reader or specialist- interested in ISIS. While minor errors exist here and there and one might disagree with some of the authors’ analysis in the detail, the book is extremely well-researched, drawing on an array of sources including much original interview testimony, and the overall conclusions that emerge are hard to contest.Link:http://www.joshualandis.com/blog/book-review-isis-inside-army-terror/

SWJ Blog
02-04-2015, 04:01 PM
After ISIS Execution, Angry King Abdullah Quotes Clint Eastwood to US Lawmakers (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/after-isis-execution-angry-king-abdullah-quotes-clint-eastwood-to-us-lawmakers)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/after-isis-execution-angry-king-abdullah-quotes-clint-eastwood-to-us-lawmakers) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
02-04-2015, 06:45 PM
After Daesh murdered Jordanian pilot Muath al-Kassasbeh who is weaker now? ISIS or Jordan, a coalition member. Three very different articles caught my attention.

First from Haaretz (Israeli) a short report that starts with:
Jordan's King Abdullah vowed a relentless war against Islamic State on their own territory...Link:http://www.haaretz.com/news/middle-east/1.640813?

A longer report by Al-Jazeera, which highlights the internal situation as shown in this passage:
Unusually for Jordan, public demonstrations on behalf of the pilot have taken explicit aim at King Abdullah, who many accuse of dragging his country — and Kassasbeh, personally — into a war it has no incentive to fight. Even the pilot’s Bararsheh tribe, whose loyalty has long helped prop up the Hashemite monarchy, has taken to the streets to call Abdullah a "coward" who takes orders from the U.S. It did not help matters that Abdullah was on a visit to Washington on Tuesday when news broke about Kassasbeh.Link:http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/2/4/after-pilots-fiery-execution-jordan-plots-its-revenge.html

The BBC has a multi-part report and Shiraz Maher, of ICSR, comments:
By burning to death Jordanian pilot, militant group Islamic State is leveraging its power to asymmetrically shock its enemies....

(He ends with) The United Arab Emirates has gone a step further and withdrawn from the coalition altogether, citing fears for the safety of its pilots.That is perhaps the most potent weapon Islamic State possess today - the carefully curated asymmetry of fear.Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-31129416

There is a parallel thread on the 'Management of Savagery', which helps explain what is happening on our screens - if you view the Daesh video of the pilot's murder - and how it affects us all. Link:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=21675

RIP Muath al-Kassasbeh
http://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/79931000/jpg/_79931371_0a385bc0-573d-4b8b-96e6-ed609a5c36cd.jpg

Bill Moore
02-04-2015, 09:21 PM
David,

U.S. major news networks kneejerk analysis is this event will galvanize the Arab/Muslim world to rise up against IS. It could, but more likely I see it as a event that will get turned against us increasingly over time. This can play out in multiple ways, and I hope by now we learned to how shape the narrative in a way that benefits us. So far though, we have failed repeatedly to develop a narrative that resonates with the intended audience. In fact, it seems the only people convinced that our narrative is right is us. :rolleyes:

davidbfpo
02-04-2015, 09:56 PM
Bill,

I think many Western observers expect the Jordanian public to react as they did after the hotel bombings in November 2005, when polling found a marked shift against AQ:
In a survey of over 1,000 Jordanians by the survey firm Ipsos, conducted for the Jordanian newspaper Al Ghad, as reported by the New York Times, two-thirds of Jordanians asked said they had changed their view of Al Qaeda after the bombings. More than 87 percent also said they considered Al Qaeda a terrorist organization, and almost as many said that Al Qaeda’s acts of terror did not represent Islam. In previous surveys in Jordan, Al Qaeda had enjoyed approval ratings upward of 60 percent.
Link not id'd as wrong source on footnote

As one article suggested will the two executed become martyrs, in Jordan or elsewhere.

I doubt any local, official message will become known easily. Does the Jordanian state do info ops anyway or just rely on fear?

Bill Moore
02-04-2015, 11:52 PM
Bill,

I think many Western observers expect the Jordanian public to react as they did after the hotel bombings in November 2005, when polling found a marked shift against AQ:
Link not id'd as wrong source on footnote

As one article suggested will the two executed become martyrs, in Jordan or elsewhere.

I doubt any local, official message will become known easily. Does the Jordanian state do info ops anyway or just rely on fear?

I thought fear was an info op? :(

This can unfold many ways, right now I would classify it as an event that multiple sides will leverage to support their narrative. It is hard for us to accept that IS could leverage this event to their advantage, but based on our collective experience of watching the competition in the information domain over the last few years we should recognize the narrative may not unfold in our favor.

Three letter agencies should promote a narrative that exploits this event in ways that resonate. The State Department, based on their continuously nave statements that resonate with no one should probably just stay quiet beyond condemning the event (follow the do no harm rule).

nmollenhauer
02-05-2015, 12:26 AM
It would be nice if we could amplify or support a locally produced (and believed) narrative. Any US produced IO campaign will only work at home, and only if it's any good.

Have we tried injecting false narratives into the ISIS IO machine?

omarali50
02-05-2015, 04:56 PM
From watching a few minutes of CNN, my impression is that the "do no harm" rule is pretty much dead by now. It will take about 8 to 9 more days before this turns against the US.

davidbfpo
02-05-2015, 11:43 PM
In an adroit, if dangerous move Jordan has:
...announced the release of Abu Muhammad al Maqdisi, a pro-al Qaeda, anti-Islamic State jihadist ideologue earlier today. And the news was quickly celebrated by Maqdisi's allies on social media.
(Later) No official explanation for Maqdisi's release has been given. But a Jordanian "security source" told Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/05/us-mideast-crisis-jordan-qaeda-idUSKBN0L92GE20150205) that "Maqdisi was expected to denounce the immolation of the Jordanian pilot" as being contrary to "faith values."
And a Jordanian television station is already advertising (https://twitter.com/RoyaTV/status/563434758470766595) an "exclusive interview" with Maqdisi, who criticizes (http://royanews.tv/articles/2015-2-5-%D9%84%D9%82%D8%A7%D8%A1-%D8%AD%D8%B5%D8%B1%D9%8A-%D9%85%D8%B9-%D8%A3%D8%A8%D9%88-%D9%85%D8%AD%D9%85%D8%AF-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D9%82%D8%AF%D8%B3%D9%8A) the Islamic State once again.
Link:http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2015/02/al_qaeda_jihadists_c.php

davidbfpo
02-06-2015, 01:32 PM
This report is based on a speech King Abdullah was due to give in Washington DC, to a conference. It has some interesting passages and I cite only one:
I am a Hashemite, a descendant of the Prophet Mohammad [PBUH]. My father the late King Hussein taught me, by everything he did, our traditions of service, moral courage, justice and brotherhood. He was a soldier who believed in peace, as I have been a soldier and believe in peace. This is what it means to be a Muslim. These are the values I teach my children and they will hand on to theirs.
Link:http://jordantimes.com/share-content/muslims-primary-target-of-war-waged-by-terrorists----king.html

davidbfpo
02-06-2015, 03:41 PM
Within a wider Pew report is this chart:http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/02/05/extremism-in-muslim-nations/

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B9Kl5S7CAAAs4xv.png

SWJ Blog
02-09-2015, 03:35 PM
Anonymous Now Targets ISIS Members (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/anonymous-now-targets-isis-members)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/anonymous-now-targets-isis-members) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
02-10-2015, 01:24 PM
From Dr Omar Ashour, a SME on the region, via the BBC in a commentary How can Jordan aid the fight against Islamic State? Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-31208815?

In effect he concludes Jordan can do very little, in part due to its internal issues and having a limited military capability.

davidbfpo
02-11-2015, 07:37 PM
I don't recall Joel Wing commenting on this issue, so here is a review on WoTR:http://warontherocks.com/2015/02/how-many-fighters-does-the-islamic-state-really-have/?singlepage=1

It ends with:
It still isn’t clear precisely how many fighters ISIL has, but its total force is likely to be closer to 100,000 than to 30,000.

SWJ Blog
02-16-2015, 10:03 AM
Some Questions for Those Pushing for US Troops Against ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/some-questions-for-those-pushing-for-us-troops-against-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/some-questions-for-those-pushing-for-us-troops-against-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
02-16-2015, 01:55 PM
Aaron Zelin's recent article was recommended by a "lurker". He takes a wide viewpoint, comparing the models used by Daesh and AQ:http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2015/01/28/the-islamic-states-model/

AdamG
02-16-2015, 03:03 PM
Dual posting -


Sixty-four Islamic State fighters have been killed and dozens wounded in Egyptian-Libyan military airstrikes on Libya, announced the spokesperson of the Libyan military, reported Al-Ahram.

http://egyptianstreets.com/2015/02/16/64-isis-members-killed-as-egypt-launches-first-foreign-strikes-in-24-years/

SWJ Blog
02-16-2015, 06:22 PM
What ISIS Really Wants (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/what-isis-really-wants)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/what-isis-really-wants) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
02-16-2015, 07:47 PM
A long article from The Atlantic by Graeme Wood, entitled 'What ISIS Really Wants' and the sub-title is the shortest read:
The Islamic State is no mere collection of psychopaths. It is a religious group with carefully considered beliefs, among them that it is a key agent of the coming apocalypse. Here’s what that means for its strategy—and for how to stop it.Link:http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/02/what-isis-really-wants/384980/

Author's mini-bio:http://gcaw.net/about-2/

The author has some choice, direct passages, here is one:
Some observers have called for escalation, including several predictable voices from the interventionist right (Max Boot, Frederick Kagan), who have urged the deployment of tens of thousands of American soldiers. These calls should not be dismissed too quickly: an avowedly genocidal organization is on its potential victims’ front lawn, and it is committing daily atrocities in the territory it already controls.
One way to un-cast the Islamic State’s spell over its adherents would be to overpower it militarily and occupy the parts of Syria and Iraq now under caliphate rule. Al‑Qaeda is ineradicable because it can survive, cockroach-like, by going underground. The Islamic State cannot. If it loses its grip on its territory in Syria and Iraq, it will cease to be a caliphate.

Malcolm Nance (SWC member) just Tweeted:
This is a good analysis but thinks #ISIS (https://twitter.com/hashtag/ISIS?src=hash) is new Twitter to AQs old Facebook.They're OBL's great caliphate army

SWJ Blog
02-18-2015, 11:43 AM
ISIS Is Not a Terrorist Group (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-is-not-a-terrorist-group)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-is-not-a-terrorist-group) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

omarali50
02-19-2015, 05:02 PM
An interesting post from Razib Khan "Islam is not a religion of the book" (http://www.unz.com/gnxp/islam-is-not-a-religion-of-the-book/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=islam-is-not-a-religion-of-the-book&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter)

http://www.unz.com/gnxp/islam-is-not-a-religion-of-the-book/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=islam-is-not-a-religion-of-the-book&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

I agree with the broad argument. Coming to prediction, I think a lot of real history is made by men (and some women) making models and predictions about what comes next and acting on the basis of these predictions. In the short term (and in the long term we are all dead) that can be the most important thing of all...distant intellectuals (including amateurs like us) have the luxury of sticking to whatever story we happen to like and adding a few bells and whistles to explain all obseved deviances (that is why postmarxists for example will never be out of a job, since all they are selling is entertaining stories to fellow enthusiasts and there are no limits on what can be fitted into the story with a little imagination), but real people are also fighting real wars while we discuss this. To the extent that they believe in a certain model today, they and their competitors can benefit from knowing what that model is. All sides will adjust as models fail and situations change...that is a given. And THAT, i guess, is the point of this post. And a good point it is too...

AdamG
02-19-2015, 05:39 PM
The Islamic State is no mere collection of psychopaths. It is a religious group with carefully considered beliefs, among them that it is a key agent of the coming apocalypse. Here’s what that means for its strategy—and for how to stop it.
Graeme Wood
March 2015

http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/02/what-isis-really-wants/384980/

Initial post for maximum visibility.

davidbfpo
02-19-2015, 05:40 PM
One of the authors of 'Inside ISIS' Hassan Hassan (See Post 89; who originates from Eastern Syria) is interviewed on:


ISIS growth in North Africa
Where ISIS is winning, and where it is losing
Tactical vs. strategic effects of airstrikes on ISIS
Influence of Management of Savegery on ISIS actions and propaganda
Importance of local forces and tribes in fighting ISIS
Challenges to building those local forces
ISIS is setting the agenda, but the world needs to change that

Link to a 41 minute podcast:http://middleeastweek.org/home/2015/2/17/isis-in-north-africa-as-war-against-them-grows

tequila
02-19-2015, 05:55 PM
A very interesting article.

Best read in counterpoint with this article by JM Berger:

Enough about Islam: Why religion is not the most useful way to understand ISIS (http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/order-from-chaos/posts/2015/02/18-enough-about-islam-berger)

Argues that ISIS is more usefully analyzed as a Sunni Muslim identity group:


And to be sure, religion matters to ISIS. A lot. But the concept of an exclusive identity matters far more, to the point that ISIS will engage in virtually unlimited theological gymnastics to justify it.

For identity-based extremist groups, one function of extreme religious observance is to serve as an identity marker, a signal to establish who is part of the in-group and who is part of the out-group.

Religion is therefore of primal importance in the narrative created by an extremist group’s adherents, but a group’s extremism does not naturally proceed from its claimed religious basis.

davidbfpo
02-19-2015, 05:56 PM
Unusually Chatham House's quarterly 'International Affairs' has placed this 15 pg article on open access:http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1468-2346.12183/pdf

Near the end is this neat summary:
Since the Islamic Revolution, Tehran has often been described as an irrational, ideologically driven actor, impelled by the notion of martyrdom and an apocalyptical world-view. Yet Iran’s foreign policy proves that it is often driven by national and regime interests. The developments in Iraq and Syria and the Iranian leadership’s response to them illustrate this fact. Indeed, Tehran’s overall strategy, as well as its willingness to engage with Saudi Arabia and the United States, demonstrate that Iran’s foreign policy does not always follow its revolutionary rhetoric.

OUTLAW 09
02-20-2015, 03:52 PM
Blast from the past as some of us know this individual up front and personal.

Another Bucca Graduate first class---US intel seems to have never figured out the old AQI command structure especially since he was evidently tied to the Zarqawi network. Our Army Iraq military prison system has produced some of the finest trained jihadi's in Iraq.

Daesh top dog in Libya is an Iraqi: Wisam Abd al-Zubaidi AKA Abu Nabil al-Anbari, Bucca graduate, Zarqawi associate http://almasalah.com/ar/NewsDetails.aspx?NewsID=47815 …

OUTLAW 09
02-20-2015, 05:29 PM
AtlanticCouncil ✔ @AtlanticCouncil
#ISIS continues to build support from tribal groups & defecting insurgents, says @faysalitani. Read more: http://buff.ly/1CSK7f7 @AP

omarali50
02-20-2015, 06:19 PM
A short comment about the broader issue of what role Islam plays or doesnt play, big picture, etc.

http://brownpundits.blogspot.com/2015/02/is-islam-religion-of-book.html

(the links add context and value)

davidbfpo
03-01-2015, 03:19 PM
Not seen one of these before. Yours to explore:http://religionresearch.org/closer/2015/02/28/an-isis-reading-list-part-one/

omarali50
03-02-2015, 06:51 PM
I have a post up about ISIS, Islam and suchlike (with due credit given to smallwars for some links at the end)

http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2015/03/isis-and-islam-beyond-the-dream.html

excerpt:

So in principle, we should be able to make new Islams as needed (and some of us have indeed done so over the centuries, the Ismailis being one extreme example; some Sufis being another) and I am sure others will do just that in the days to come. The Reza Aslan types are right about this much (though i seriously doubt that he can invent anything new or lasting; that does not even seem to be his primary aim). In fact, in terms of practice, millions of Muslims have already "invented new Islams". Just as a random example, most contemporary Muslims do not have sex with multiple concubines that they captured in the most recent Jihad expedition to the Balkans (or bought from African slave-traders for that matter). Not only do they not buy and sell slaves, they find the thought of doing so somewhat shocking. Also see how countless Muslims lived very obediently under British laws in the British empire and in fact provided a good part of the armies of that empire. Or see the countless Muslims who take oaths of loyalty to all sorts of "un-Islamic" states and, for the most part, turn out to be as loyal and law-abiding as any of their Hindu or Sikh or Christian fellow citizens in the various hedonistic modern states. Their "Islam" has already adapted itself to new realities.

What sets Muslms apart is really their inability (until now) to publicly and comfortably articulate a philosophical rejection of medieval (aka no longer fashionable) elements of classical Sunni Islam. And for all practical purposes, this is a serious problem only in Muslim majority countries. In other countries that have a strong sense of their own identity and of the necessity of their own laws, Muslims mostly get on with life while following those laws. In the Muslim majority countires, it is the apostasy and blasphemy laws (and the broader memes that uphold those laws) that play a central role in preventing public rejection of unfashionable or unworkable aspects of classical Islam. A King Hussein or a Benazir Bhutto or even a Rouhani may have private thoughts rejecting X or Y inconvenient parts of medieval Islamicate laws and theology, but to speak up would be to invite accusations of blasphemy and apostasy. So they fudge, they hem and haw, and they do one thing while paying lip service to another. Unfortunately, this means the upholders of classical Islam have the edge in debates in the public sphere. And ISIS and the Wahabis are not far enough from mainstream classical Sunni Islam for us to think they are just some demonic eruption from outer space; for example, classical Islamic theology recommends cutting the hands of thieves, stoning adulterers, going on jihad (not just some inner jihad of the Karen Armstrong type, but the real deal), capturing slaves, buying and selling concubines, killing apostates and so on; ISIS of course goes much further in their willingness to kill other Muslims, to rebel against existing rulers and to bypass common humanity and commonly cited restrictions and regulations about prisoners, hostages, punishments and so on, but when they say classical Islam permits the first set of things noted above, they are not lying, the apologists are lying.

- See more at: http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2015/03/isis-and-islam-beyond-the-dream.html#sthash.4L0W3lGm.dpuf

davidbfpo
03-02-2015, 07:47 PM
Aymenn Al-Tamimi (http://www.thedailybeast.com/contributors/aymenn-al-tamimi.html)

Aymenn Al-Tamimi has a short article 'The U.S. Anti-ISIS Strategy’s True Cost' and sub-titled 'Can the U.S. do anything to stop Iran’s influence from expanding in Iraq while it counts on the country as a quiet partner against ISIS?':http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/03/01/the-u-s-anti-isis-strategy-s-true-cost.html


Concern has been expressed that the U.S. ‘risks’ losing Iraq to Iran in the fight against IS, but it is probably more accurate to say the U.S. has already lost Iraq to Iran. No good options seem to exist, and the expansion of Iran’s sphere of influence may well have to be accepted as an inevitable consequence of the original decision to invade Iraq and remove Saddam’s regime from power.

AdamG
03-14-2015, 09:44 PM
Temporary separate thread for maximum visibility.


CIA Director John Brennan said Friday that the Islamic State had “snowballed” beyond Iraq and Syria, estimating that at least 20,000 fighters from more than 90 countries have gone to join the militant group, several thousand of them from Western nations, including the United States.

Brennan’s statement marks a change from the narrative the Obama administration has been pushing on the success of the fight against ISIS.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/03/14/reports-success-against-isis-overinflated/

AdamG
03-14-2015, 09:45 PM
The war in Syria has attracted roughly 100 foreign fighters from the Caribbean who could easily make their way to the United States, said the top U.S. military commander for the southern hemisphere.

http://www.defenseone.com/threats/2015/03/us-military-concerned-isis-fighters-returning-caribbean-could-reach-Border/107421/

davidbfpo
03-19-2015, 02:34 PM
I have seen many Tweets and a few articles on the success of ISIS / Daesh's info ops, so have added this link here, rather than in the Media arena:
a very short discussion paper about the way in which terrorist groups, and specifically Islamic State, use modern encryption systems to evade surveillance. It examines how the risks of online anonymity are weighed against its many social, personal and economic benefits. It sets out a small number of recommendations about how the intelligence and security services might respond to the growing availability and use of encryption services.
Link:http://www.demos.co.uk/publications/onlineanonymity

It is a free download!

Bill Moore
03-19-2015, 08:25 PM
Here is a link to the latest Frontline special on ISIS. As normal, it is very well done. It is pretty graphic, so I don't recommend watching if you have the kids in the room. ISIS are clearly criminally insane, but this special presents a balanced view and demonstrates that the Shi'a death squads are almost as evil as ISIS.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/rise-of-isis/?elqTrackId=643B54FFC6FC36B84E1B666CCC420E0B&elq=b1298085b43541d99f1452a297dae562&elqCampaignId=1233&elqaid=2495&elqat=1

SWJ Blog
03-23-2015, 02:53 AM
ISIS For The Common Man (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/isis-for-the-common-man)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/isis-for-the-common-man) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

JWing
03-25-2015, 02:19 PM
IS has proven nothing if not resourceful throughout its life. It now appears that it has entered the European drug trade for a source of funding, specifically bringing in Afghan heroin. Here's my article on it (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/03/islamic-state-enters-european-drug-trade.html).

davidbfpo
04-06-2015, 03:13 PM
A short interview with Will McCants (of Brookings) on his forthcoming book, that starts with:
But there's something else that makes the group unusual that has gotten less attention: ISIS says, quite openly (http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/02/what-isis-really-wants/384980/), that its ultimate mission is to bring about the apocalypse.....the belief in an apocalyptic, has come to play an important role in the group's strategy actions. This, McCants argues, has clear implications for how ISIS thinks — and how it acts.

He ends with thsi vision being "double sided":
Apocalypticism can certainly be a powerful tool for attracting recruits and justifying what you're doing. But if you disappoint apocalyptic expectations, it can easily work against you.
Link:http://www.vox.com/2015/4/6/8341691/isis-apocalypse

davidbfpo
04-07-2015, 05:33 PM
From an Israeli think tank, The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center a short paper that starts with:
One of the interesting phenomena of the civil war in Syria is the tacit understandings between two sworn enemies: the Assad regime and the terrorist organization ISIS. These understandings are about operating and marketing the products of the oil and gas fields, most of which are located in areas controlled by ISIS (see map). There are also arrangements for the distribution of electricity between the two sides. These understandings make it easier for ISIS to produce and market its oil and gas to the Syrian market. For the Syrian regime, they provide a (limited) solution to the shortage of energy resources in the territories under its control.
Link:http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/en/article/20793

Money talks and I note the suspected intermediary is a Christian Syrian, with an Alawite wife, with Russian links.

One wonders if the opponents of both Bashir Assad and ISIS use this "business is business" relationship in their media campaign?

davidbfpo
04-13-2015, 03:41 PM
The title was prompted by a Soufan Group intell briefing on ISIS taking part of the Yarmouk camp in Damascus, a long established Palestinian refugee camp:http://soufangroup.com/tsg-intelbrief-the-islamic-states-population-shields/

The briefing's main point is that ISIS needs to have people as a shield against attacks:
Fighters from the group stormed into Yarmuk refugee camp near Damascus, Syria, in part due to some of its fighters’ previous affiliation with the camp but also because it offers a sanctuary from coalition airstrikes and a population that can’t be evacuated to clear the way for a massive assaultThe camp's population has shrunk massively already, IIRC from 160k to 18k and has been beseiged by the Bashir regime (including other Palestinians) for three years already.

I know ISIS control is being contested, although IIRC not by the bashir regime currently and little has been reported here on diplomatic activity.

Will ISIS in pursuing its strategy stop anyone leaving the camp? Clearly most have left already.

Personally I do not see Yarmouk as a shield for ISIS, simply as it is largely wrecked already and those who could leave have gone already. Nor are the coalition likely to mount air strikes against Yarmouk.

A comment article on the fate of Yarmouk:http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/12/refugees-yarmouk-israel-palestinians-arab-isis

davidbfpo
04-18-2015, 01:14 PM
Although the original documents are cited and not displayed a fascinating Der Spiegel article on the ex-Iraqi AF officer who was the strategist for ISIS to gain power and success:http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/islamic-state-files-show-structure-of-islamist-terror-group-a-1029274.html


Samir Abd Muhammad al-Khlifawi was the real name of the Iraqi, whose bony features were softened by a white beard. But no one knew him by that name. Even his best-known pseudonym, Haji Bakr, wasn't widely known. But that was precisely part of the plan. The former colonel in the intelligence service of Saddam Hussein's air defense force had been secretly pulling the strings at IS for years. Former members of the group had repeatedly mentioned him as one of its leading figures. Still, it was never clear what exactly his role was. But when the architect of the Islamic State died, he left something behind that he had intended to keep strictly confidential: the blueprint for this state.

CrowBat
04-23-2015, 09:02 AM
That article is an absolute 'must read'. Explains all the 'whys' and 'hows': it's really so that plenty of events we've seen the last few years are 'making sense'.

Moderator's Note: new thread created for maximum visibility on this Der Speigel article.

davidbfpo
04-23-2015, 09:52 AM
Although the original documents are cited and not displayed a fascinating Der Spiegel article on the ex-Iraqi AF officer who was the strategist for ISIS to gain power and success:http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/islamic-state-files-show-structure-of-islamist-terror-group-a-1029274.html


amir Abd Muhammad al-Khlifawi was the real name of the Iraqi, whose bony features were softened by a white beard. But no one knew him by that name. Even his best-known pseudonym, Haji Bakr, wasn't widely known. But that was precisely part of the plan. The former colonel in the intelligence service of Saddam Hussein's air defense force had been secretly pulling the strings at IS for years. Former members of the group had repeatedly mentioned him as one of its leading figures. Still, it was never clear what exactly his role was. But when the architect of the Islamic State died, he left something behind that he had intended to keep strictly confidential: the blueprint for this state.

The article has been commended on Twitter and SWC's Crowbat commented:
That article is an absolute 'must read'. Explains all the 'whys' and 'hows': it's really so that plenty of events we've seen the last few years are 'making sense'.

So I have reposted this, it appeared on the Watching ISIS thread four days ago.

davidbfpo
04-29-2015, 03:23 PM
Hat tip to WoTR for this follow-on article on ISIS and its control strategy. Near the start the author writes:
Lost in this headline-generating exercise is the real value of the article — its description of ISIL’s tactics in infiltrating new territory and implementing a program of discriminate violence designed to establish control over desired areas.

It concludes in part with:
ou ask most observers how a place like Jurf reverted to ISIL control in 2013, they will most likely point to the sectarian nature of the regime of former Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki. While this undoubtedly led a significant amount of Sunnis to lose support for the government, it is difficult to measure that impact on ISIL’s campaign in Iraq — particularly because this support for ISIL can be fickle and shallow. I offer an explanation on ISIL’s rise in Iraq that is based on observable data, and one that complements the descriptions of ISIL’s rise in Syria found in the Haji Bakr papers. ISIL took the cities and towns back with an efficient campaign that focused on removing key nodes of a pro-government network and replacing it with its own control apparatus. By wresting control of the key terrain and population centers it desired, it was able to enforce and elicit a basic level of collaboration from the population. Undoubtedly, at this point opportunistic tribes and members assisted the group, but that is exactly what control facilitates and encourages according to Kalyvas’ theory on irregular warfare.

IIRC Kalyvas' theory appears elsewhere here.

Link:http://warontherocks.com/2015/04/isils-small-ball-warfare-an-effective-way-to-get-back-into-a-ballgame/?singlepage=1

OUTLAW 09
04-29-2015, 04:42 PM
Although the original documents are cited and not displayed a fascinating Der Spiegel article on the ex-Iraqi AF officer who was the strategist for ISIS to gain power and success:http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/islamic-state-files-show-structure-of-islamist-terror-group-a-1029274.html



The article has been commended on Twitter and SWC's Crowbat commented:

So I have reposted this, it appeared on the Watching ISIS thread four days ago.

Not sure just why the der Spiegel is late in this article as it was the GDR MfS that trained the entire Iraqi intelligence officer corp at Baghdad University for over 10 years.

Notice der Spiegel did not mention that small point---wrote a number of intel reports to national level on the MfS training of individual Iraq intel agents but it never seemed to interest them--all virtually all the Sunni intel officers had joined the Sunni insurgency shortly after the arrival of the US in Baghdad.

Many of them had been focused on the monitoring of the Salafists activity inside Iraq and were quite aware of who was who when we arrived so it was not hard to shift alliances.

We never seemed to want to believe this.

flagg
04-29-2015, 07:56 PM
I would agree the article is a "must read", but did anyone else notice the gap in it?

How much money was needed to initiate/sustain it all and where did it come from?

Do basic business principals(with some modification) apply to insurgencies?

Start up businesses are historically/notoriously/consistently short of both capital and cash flow.

If you attempt to grow your business TOO fast you are at risk of growing it to death.

While the article covers opportunities for IS to build it's balance sheet(asset seizure) and revenue(cash flow from extortion/standover), it leaves a very big "show me the money" hole.

The Iraqi Central Bank Baghdad office theft in 2003 and the possibly erroneous report of the Iraqi Central Bank Mosul office theft in 2014 come to mind:
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/0378d4f4-0c28-11e4-9080-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3YjBjr4Vx

Is "Show me the Money!" relevant and critical to this story?

IF so, where did the money come from? Iraqi/organic, Saudi? Qatari? Other?

CrowBat
05-09-2015, 06:19 PM
A very good summary about Daesh's financing was published by the ISW quite a long ago, in form of this PDF file: Terrorist Financing and Islamic State (http://www.washingtoninstitute.org/uploads/Documents/testimony/LevittTestimony20141113.pdf)

...ISIS, which has renamed itself the Islamic State and unilaterally declared the reestablishment of an Islamic caliphate, was financially self-sufficient for about eight years as a terrorist and insurgent group before committing itself to running a proto-state.

...

And unlike other groups, which are reliant on state sponsors, major donors, or abuse of charity, AQI was financially independent by virtue of engaging in tremendously successful criminal activity enterprises domestically within Iraq.

By September, estimates put ISIS's daily income at around $3 million, giving it a total value of assets between $1.3 and $2 billion, making it the world's best-funded terrorist group. By this standard, ISIS draws more income than many small nations, including Tonga, Nauru, and the Marshall Islands.
...
Prior to the air campaign against ISIS that began in August, the group operated around 350 oil wells in Iraq and 60% of Syria's oil fields. In August, oil production from facilities under ISIS control was estimated at around 80,000 barrels per day. ISIS is believed to sell some 30,000 barrels a day in Iraq and 50,000 in Syria, which go for roughly $40 per barrel on the black market. ISIS only produces around a fifth of the total capacity of the oil fields under its control in Iraq and Syria. Even prior to the conflict, Syria's oil fields were considered old and inefficient, producing only 10% of total capacity. ISIS has tapped into pre-existing black market routes that date back to the 1990s and the smuggling networks that popped up under the Saddam-era oil-for-food program. It uses these to sell extracted crude oil to smugglers, who then transport the oil outside of conflict zones using a variety of means: tanker trucks, vans, jerry cans carried by mules, makeshift pipes, and even rafts when crossing rivers. In one case, Turkish authorities found an underground pipeline as long as 3 miles (4.8 kilometers).

...
...singled out Qatar as an especially "permissive jurisdiction" for terrorist financing. Qatari oversight is so lax, Cohen noted, that "several major Qatar-based fundraisers act as local representatives for larger terrorist fundraising networks that are based in Kuwait." Not wanting to expose sensitive intelligence, Cohen pointed to press reports that Qatar supports not only Hamas but also extremist groups operating in Syria.

...
...Abd al-Rahman al-Nuaymi, a Qatari academic and businessman, to its terror list, noting he "ordered the transfer of nearly $600,000 to al- Qa'ida via al-Qa'ida's representative in Syria, Abu-Khalid al-Suri, and intended to transfer nearly $50,000 more." An equal opportunity terror financier, al-Nuaymi also sent over $2 million per month to al-Qaeda in Iraq (now called ISIS), to al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), and to al-Shabab in Somalia.

...
...described Kuwait as the "epicenter of fundraising for terrorist groups in Syria." Kuwait is more politically vibrant, and thus more volatile than Qatar. Any meaningful crackdown on terrorist financing would certainly "invite the wrath of powerful Salafist politicians and clerics...as well as the Sunni majority who have criticized the government for not providing enough military support to the Syrian opposition."

...
...More than a third of Iraq's 12,000 archaeological sites are under ISIS control. Excavating and selling artifacts that date back to 9,000 BCE has provided ISIS its second-largest revenue stream after illicit oil sales. Many of these items are smuggled into Europe via Turkey, Iran, and Syria. While it is nearly impossible to estimate the total profits of selling these artifacts, it is known that one lion sculpture from the region sold for more than $50 million

...
...Lastly, ransom payments from kidnappings may comprise nearly 20% of ISIS's revenue. Treasury Undersecretary Cohen has estimated that ISIS has received $20 million in ransoms this year alone. Kurdish forces estimate the group takes in $10 million a month from kidnapping. France may have paid $18 million for four of its captured journalists in April. Internally, ISIS manages a thriving ***-trafficking industry. Estimates of the number of kidnapped Yazidi women and girls forced into marriage or *** slavery range from 2,500 to 4,000. Women are sold at a low price, however, often as low as $10, mainly to attract more ISIS recruits, not as a fundraising mechanism.


Now keep in mind: this is only the known part of related activities, and then primarily related to Iraq. Now add activities of their sympathisers and supporters in various Arab countries, add their cooperation with the Assadist regime in Syria, add even the activity of their sympathisers and representatives inside Iran... to this equotation, and the picture might become quite complete.

davidbfpo
05-21-2015, 12:29 PM
A UK C4 News commentary on an ISIS guide to the caliphate, aimed mainly at the UK and the West. In places one wonders if this is 'black' propaganda. It is very short at four minutes:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHzkeh9SZHE

The post title is missing the first 'I' and is not meant to refer to spooks.

Bill Moore
05-29-2015, 11:30 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2015/05/28/the-u-s-trained-commander-of-tajikistans-special-forces-has-joined-the-islamic-state/

The U.S.-trained commander of Tajikistan’s special forces has joined the Islamic State


In late April, the chief of an elite police unit in Tajikistan disappeared. Relatives said Col. Gulmurod Khalimov, who commanded the Tajik Interior Ministry's special forces, had gone on a business trip. Other rumors suggested he had vanished after falling out with colleagues at a high-level meeting.

Now, there appears to be more clarity: Khalimov is in Syria and has defected to the Islamic State.

Bill Moore
05-30-2015, 01:23 PM
What? IS is effective at gathering intelligence and conducting deception operations. Who would have thunk it? I'm in shock that we somehow find this new, but I'm beginning to think that we really have forgotten a lot of the basics based on our overreliance of technical intelligence.

http://www.voanews.com/content/islamic-state-skilled-gathering-intelligence-adjusting-tactics/2798771.html

Experts: IS Skilled at Gathering Intelligence, Adjusting Tactics


We are about 60 to 90 days behind ISIS,” former intelligence officer and military adviser Michael Pregent told VOA, referring to the Islamic State by one of its acronyms.


In addition, according to Jennifer Cafarella, a fellow at the Institute for the Study of War, the extremist group has become adept at misinformation and diversionary tactics.

SWJ Blog
06-09-2015, 10:58 PM
ISIS Publishes Manual on ‘How to Survive in the West’ (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-publishes-manual-on-%E2%80%98how-to-survive-in-the-west%E2%80%99)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-publishes-manual-on-%E2%80%98how-to-survive-in-the-west%E2%80%99) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
06-17-2015, 04:39 PM
Citing the CIS Antiterrorism Center head:
According to the security services, about 2,000 holders of Russian passports are fighting for ISIL. Some experts believe their actual number may near 5,000.
Link:http://www.interfax-religion.com/?act=news&div=12116

Curious as that would make Russia a significant source of fighters. The bona fides of the website are unknown.

davidbfpo
06-17-2015, 09:48 PM
A strategic briefing from the London-based Quilliam Foundation,, that aims to provide an insight into Islamic State's propaganda machine. their key conclusions:


A “good” image brings real power. IS’ careful and consistent branding exercise has enabled it to attract new recruits and donors, as well as satisfy the needs of current supporters.
IS’ declaration of the caliphate was a strategic calculation that was long in the making. Now, everything it does publicly is geared towards maintaining its image.
The brand has been crafted such that it appeals to a range of audiences, not just jihadists. Shrouding its actions beneath religion and history, it promises utopia, camaraderie, empowerment and adventure – these are key drivers for recruitment.
The campaign against Islamic State is a war of information just as much as it is military. If we are ever to effectively “degrade and destroy” the IS organisation, we must radically restructure our efforts.

Quilliam's President, Noman Benotman, a former Libyan jihadist with LIFG, has a great sentence:
We will never be able to live with the terrorism of IS, so we must figure out a way to defeat it.

Link:http://www.quilliamfoundation.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/publications/free/quilliam-strategic-assessment-is-one-year-on.pdf

JWing
06-22-2015, 05:40 PM
I just posted this over in the Iraq thread but thought it should be noted here as well. I just published an interview with Naval War College Prof Craig Whiteside on the revival of the Islamic State. He challenges the conventional wisdom that it was Syria, the Maliki government and Baathists that led to the group's comeback. Here's a link (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/06/behind-revival-of-islamic-state-in-iraq.html). It's a must read.

davidbfpo
06-25-2015, 07:35 AM
A short Israeli article on ISIS that opens with this (with my emphasis):
Although experts on terrorism, security officials and decision makers worldwide concur that IS poses an unparalleled threat, they disagree about the answers to the following four key questions:

What is the Nature of the Islamic State? Should IS be regarded as a terrorist organization? Does its scope of operations, paramilitary activities, involvement in guerilla warfare and insurgency, and control over vast territories and populations not stretch the definition of a terrorist organization?[1]
Are the Doctrines of the Islamic State an Innovation? By its actions, is the Islamic State introducing new doctrines and concepts, or is it merely implementing and refining modern terrorism strategies, which aim to spread fear and anxiety to achieve political goals?
What are the Islamic State’s Aspirations? Are the Islamic State’s aspirations limited to the Middle East, or does it see itself as avant garde, spearheading an operation whose objective is global? Is the Islamic State striving for hegemony and, ultimately, to establish a caliphate in Syria, Iraq and the Levant? Or does it see such a caliphate as only the first step in its drive to establish a global caliphate? In this regard, how does IS differ from Al-Qaeda, if at all?[2]
What is the Islamic State’s Strategic Situation? Following the successful military campaign of summer 2014 that enabled IS to seize extensive swaths of Syria and Iraq, the organization’s progress seems to have stalled – in part thanks to the establishment of a broad coalition of international allies, whose goal was to halt the organization’s advance and eradicate it. Does this mark “the beginning of the end” for IS? Is it on the brink of disappearing? Or, despite the air and ground military campaign of the international coalition, will the Islamic State recoup its losses and experience a resurgence, pushing past Syria and Iraq?[3]

How we answer these four questions will affect not only our understanding of the nature, aims and activities of the Islamic State; it will also dictate what counter-strategy should be implemented in order to stop, if not trounce, the Islamic State. To this end, I will analyze the essence of the Islamic State and revisit its definition as a “terrorist organization.
Link:http://www.ict.org.il/Article/1424/Four-Questions-on-ISIS


Cross posted on a RFI thread.

JWing
06-26-2015, 02:57 PM
Video (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/06/blog-post_26.html) of JM Berger discussing his book ISIS The State of Terror

SWJ Blog
07-01-2015, 04:31 PM
ISIS and the Family Man (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/isis-and-the-family-man)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/isis-and-the-family-man) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
07-07-2015, 08:41 PM
Professors John Horgan & Mia Bloom are currently researching this subject and have written up a short explanation:https://news.vice.com/article/this-is-how-the-islamic-state-manufactures-child-militants

Here is a taster:
Our research on conflicts from Sri Lanka to Northern Ireland has taught us that the first priority of terrorist organizations is not figuring out how to destroy their enemies, but ensuring the survival of the organization itself. The Islamic State is far more than a simple terrorist organization, but there can be no doubt that it has embraced the need to groom the next generation.

Children have been involved in Iraqi violence before, a 2007 thread:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=3741

davidbfpo
07-17-2015, 09:14 AM
Ben Barry, IISS, gives a short assessment of the region in a video (5 mins) and comments that 700 Malays have gone to ISIS for them to form a battallion - I don't recall seeing that in the public domain before:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFIB3T2H4p0&feature=youtu.be

He ends with a bleak forecast.

JWing
07-22-2015, 05:13 PM
Cross posting this on this ISIS thread. I just published my 88th interview for Musings On Iraq. I talked with Michael Weiss co-author of ISIS Inside the Army of Terror. We talked about the rise of IS and its recent rebirth. Here's a link (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-rise-and-rebirth-of-islamic-state.html).

SWJ Blog
07-31-2015, 02:15 AM
‘Confronting ISIS in Libya: The Case for an Expeditionary Counterinsurgency’ (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/%E2%80%98confronting-isis-in-libya-the-case-for-an-expeditionary-counterinsurgency%E2%80%99)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/%E2%80%98confronting-isis-in-libya-the-case-for-an-expeditionary-counterinsurgency%E2%80%99) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
07-31-2015, 02:13 PM
A War With ISIS is a Battle Against Ideologies (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/a-war-with-isis-is-a-battle-against-ideologies)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/a-war-with-isis-is-a-battle-against-ideologies) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
08-09-2015, 01:06 PM
Interview: Thinking About ISIS in Strategic Terms (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/interview-thinking-about-isis-in-strategic-terms)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/interview-thinking-about-isis-in-strategic-terms) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
08-12-2015, 02:43 PM
ISIS and the Sex Factor (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/isis-and-the-sex-factor)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/isis-and-the-sex-factor) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
08-13-2015, 09:25 AM
The NY Review of Books looks at two books: 'ISIS: Inside the Army of Terror by Michael Weiss and Hassan Hassan and 'ISIS: The State of Terror by Jessica Stern and J.M. Berger:http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2015/aug/13/mystery-isis/

This closing passage struck home for me:
None of our analysts, soldiers, diplomats, intelligence officers, politicians, or journalists has yet produced an explanation rich enough—even in hindsight—to have predicted the movement’s rise.We hide this from ourselves with theories and concepts that do not bear deep examination. And we will not remedy this simply through the accumulation of more facts. It is not clear whether our culture can ever develop sufficient knowledge, rigor, imagination, and humility to grasp the phenomenon of ISIS. But for now, we should admit that we are not only horrified but baffled.

SWJ Blog
08-13-2015, 02:28 PM
ISIS Enshrines a Theology of Rape (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-enshrines-a-theology-of-rape)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-enshrines-a-theology-of-rape) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

JWing
08-19-2015, 03:08 PM
Cross posting here.

I just collected together 10 different experts and got their opinions on how they believe the war against the Islamic State is going. That includes Ahmed Ali of the American University of Iraq-Sulaimani, J.M. Berger of the Brookings Institution, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Dr. Michael Knights of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Aron Lund of Syria in Crisis, Alex Mello of Horizon Client Access, Douglas Ollivant of the New America Foundation, Aymenn Jawad al-Tamimi of the Middle East Forum, Craig Whiteside of the Naval War College, and Aaron Zelin of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. Here's a link to the article (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/08/how-is-war-against-islamic-state-going.html).

davidbfpo
08-21-2015, 08:46 PM
A superb Will McCants article, in advance of his book being published. Why does it beat AQ:
The State revels in gore and wants everyone to know it. And yet it has been remarkably successful at recruiting fighters, capturing land, subduing its subjects, and creating a state. Why? Because violence and gore work. We forget that this terrifying approach to state building has an impressive track record.
Link:http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/08/isis-jihad-121525.html#ixzz3jU5NdnvC


The book is:The ISIS Apocalypse: The History, Strategy, and Doomsday Vision of the Islamic State (http://www.amazon.com/The-ISIS-Apocalypse-Strategy-Doomsday/dp/1250080908)


Vox has a short article too; which ends with:
ISIS's ideological origins continue to shape the group's actions today. If we fail to understand that, we will also fail to fully understand the group's strategy, its strengths, and its weaknesses.
Link:http://www.vox.com/2015/8/21/9183419/isis-iraq-apocalypse

(http://www.amazon.com/The-ISIS-Apocalypse-Strategy-Doomsday/dp/1250080908)

JWing
08-24-2015, 02:29 PM
The Islamic State's No. 2 man in charge of its operations in Iraq was said to have been killed by a US drone strike outside of Mosul. The problem, this is the third time the man has allegedly been killed by US airpower. Read the story here (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/08/islamic-states-second-in-command-killed.html).

SWJ Blog
08-26-2015, 12:18 AM
Pentagon Examines Allegations of Skewed ISIS Reports (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/pentagon-examines-allegations-of-skewed-isis-reports)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/pentagon-examines-allegations-of-skewed-isis-reports) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
08-26-2015, 01:04 PM
To Respond to ISIS and Hybrid Warfare We Need to Invest in POPINT (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/to-respond-to-isis-and-hybrid-warfare-we-need-to-invest-in-popint)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/to-respond-to-isis-and-hybrid-warfare-we-need-to-invest-in-popint) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
08-28-2015, 12:30 AM
Airpower and ISIS: Encouraging Battlefield Innovation from Tactical Leaders (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/airpower-and-isis-encouraging-battlefield-innovation-from-tactical-leaders)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/airpower-and-isis-encouraging-battlefield-innovation-from-tactical-leaders) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
09-01-2015, 03:55 PM
From Will McCants of Brookings, an essay 'The Believer: Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi', which has had rave reviews on Twitter today:http://www.brookings.edu/research/essays/2015/thebeliever?cid=00900019020011001US0001

It is a longer article, but this paragraph struck me:
But the bare facts of Baghdadi’s biography show an unusually capable man. He helped found an insurgent group, finished a Ph.D. while managing the religious affairs of the Islamic State, and has been able to prevail amid the State’s cutthroat politics because of his skill at coalition building and his ability to intimidate his rivals....the believer became the commander of the believers, seeking to impose his savagely bleak religious vision on the entire world.

His final sentence say enough:
If Baghdadi’s life is a cautionary tale, it is about the danger of creating the chaos that allows men like him to flourish.

SWJ Blog
09-05-2015, 08:40 AM
Why is ISIS Blowing Up History? (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/why-is-isis-blowing-up-history)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/why-is-isis-blowing-up-history) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
09-06-2015, 08:22 PM
Air Power Can Only Do So Much in ISIS Fight (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/air-power-can-only-do-so-much-in-isis-fight)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/air-power-can-only-do-so-much-in-isis-fight) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
09-07-2015, 10:14 AM
U.S. Revamping Syrian Rebel Force in Fight Against ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/us-revamping-syrian-rebel-force-in-fight-against-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/us-revamping-syrian-rebel-force-in-fight-against-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
09-07-2015, 11:00 PM
Defeating ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/defeating-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/defeating-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
09-10-2015, 02:56 AM
50 Spies Say ISIS Intelligence Was Cooked (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/50-spies-say-isis-intelligence-was-cooked)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/50-spies-say-isis-intelligence-was-cooked) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
09-16-2015, 07:35 AM
Top News Analysts Detail Claims That Reports on ISIS Were Distorted (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/top-news-analysts-detail-claims-that-reports-on-isis-were-distorted)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/top-news-analysts-detail-claims-that-reports-on-isis-were-distorted) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
09-17-2015, 09:00 PM
A long and well reviewed article in The Guardian:http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/17/why-isis-fight-syria-iraq



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/why-isis-fights) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
09-17-2015, 09:00 PM
A long and well reviewed article in The Guardian:http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/17/why-isis-fight-syria-iraq



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/why-isis-fights) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
09-21-2015, 01:24 PM
These stories matter. At last an open source ICSR report on why IS defectors exit the fight. Well reviewed overnight via Twitter and tonight on CNN at 7pm Dr Peter Neumann explains.

From the ICSR Summary:
Much has been written about the young men and women who join the Islamic State. We are familiar with their biographies and pathways, backgrounds and motivations. But virtually nothing is known about those who quit: the ‘defectors’ who didn’t like what they saw, abandoned their comrades, and fled the Islamic State. Yet their stories could be key to stopping the flow of foreign fighters, countering the group’s propaganda, and exposing its lies and hypocrisy.
For a short paper, ICSR collected all published stories about people who have left the Islamic State and spoken about their defection. We discovered a total of 58 – a sizable number but probably only a fraction of those who are disillusioned or ready to leave.
Link, including the full report:http://icsr.info/2015/09/icsr-report-narratives-islamic-state-defectors/


A BBC report:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-34313337

davidbfpo
09-21-2015, 07:02 PM
The five minute CNN broadcast:http://edition.cnn.com/videos/world/2015/09/21/isis-intv-amanpour-peter-neumann.cnn/video/playlists/amanpour/

A Q&A transcript on VOX:http://www.vox.com/2015/9/21/9365953/isis-defections

davidbfpo
09-22-2015, 08:09 AM
Jason Burke, the veteran Observer and Guardian correspondent and author of the bestselling book Al-Qaeda, has a new book out The New Threat from Islamic Militancy and a reviewer says:
is the most accessible and up-to-date analysis of the development of Islamic militancy. It gives a clear and convincing account of the evolution through the 20th century of the philosophy that seeks to justify this particular brand of terror.

More telling is the first paragraph:
One of the more shocking recent testimonies regarding Islamic State comes from Yazidi girls captured during the assault on Mount Sinjar (http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/07/40000-iraqis-stranded-mountain-isis-death-threat) in August 2014. The girls were immediately separated from their families and sold as sex slaves to Isis fighters. The justification for the sale and for their being bound, gagged and raped lies in the Qur’an, which, according to this interpretation, states that raping unbelievers is an act of devotion to God. One of the brave followers of the black flag said that rape was a form of prayer and brought him closer to Allah.
Link:http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/sep/22/new-threat-islamic-militancy-jason-burke-review

SWJ Blog
09-24-2015, 05:17 PM
Deconstructing ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/deconstructing-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/deconstructing-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

JWing
09-27-2015, 05:36 PM
I've been posting a bunch of video that might be of interest.

DUKE VIDEO: ISIS Terrorism At And Abroad Jessica Stern
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/duke-video-isis-terrorism-at-and-abroad.html

INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR COUNTER-TERRORISM VIDEO: Islamic State Future of Global Jihad?
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/international-institute-for-counter.html

ASIA SOCIETY VIDEO: ISIS Implications In Asia
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/asia-society-video-isis-implications-in.html

NYU SCHOOL OF LAW VIDEO: Iran, ISIS and the Future of Gulf Security
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/nyu-school-of-law-video-iran-isis-and.html

CSIS: What ISIS Really Wants
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/08/csis-what-isis-really-wants.html

WASH INST FOR NEAR EAST POLICY VIDEO: Fight Against ISIL Shiite Militias & The Coalition Effort
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/07/wash-inst-for-near-east-policy-video.html

H VAN LYNDEN LECTURE VIDEO: Jihad on Our Doorstep: Inside the Minds of Jihadis in Syria and Iraq
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/07/h-van-lynden-lecture-video-jihad-on-our.html

H VAN LYNDEN LECTURE VIDEO: ISIS Tilting The Chess Board Dawn Of A New Middle East
http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/07/h-van-lynden-lecture-video-isis-tilting.html

JWing
09-28-2015, 02:18 PM
Just did a very interesting interview with Australian National University's Haroro Ingram about Islamic State's information campaign. Thinks that follows traditional insurgent/revolutionary doctrine on use of propaganda and presents people with rational choice decisions to win over local support. Here's a link (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/analyzing-islamic-states-information.html).

JWing
10-02-2015, 02:25 PM
New video up on ISIS that includes Fmr Amb Robert Ford from World Affairs Council in Atlanta

http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/10/world-affairs-council-video-syria-iraq.html

SWJ Blog
10-05-2015, 04:20 PM
US Aims to Put More Pressure on ISIS in Syria (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/us-aims-to-put-more-pressure-on-isis-in-syria)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/us-aims-to-put-more-pressure-on-isis-in-syria) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

JWing
10-12-2015, 02:21 PM
Just interviewed Charlie Winter of the Quilliam Foundation about his recent study of info output by the Islamic State. Here's a link (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/10/breaking-down-islamic-states-media.html).

Bill Moore
10-12-2015, 05:41 PM
Just interviewed Charlie Winter of the Quilliam Foundation about his recent study of info output by the Islamic State. Here's a link (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/10/breaking-down-islamic-states-media.html).

Much thanks to JWing for sharing this pithy and valuable interview. Some key excerpts I found valuable:

First, it seems that in the West we only see the ultra violent propaganda ISIL promotes, and we're left wondering how that draws thousands of recruits. The reality is that their propaganda is much broader in scope and depth.


First off, brutality is far from prominent. Indeed, often, it doesn’t come up at all. Far more important is the content that prioritises conveying the themes of victimhood, war and civilian life. On a daily basis, numerous visual reports emerge of dead or maimed children and decimated infrastructure in the ‘caliphate’, things that are instrumentalised in order to legitimise and justify Islamic State’s very existence. . . . Most prominent by far, though, are depictions of civilian life – . . . The intention of this content is obvious: Islamic State’s ‘state’ is being sold as a true utopia, a viable, practicable alternative to the status quo.


In ‘The Virtual Caliphate: Understanding Islamic State’s Propaganda Strategy’, . . . I identified six key themes of the Islamic State narrative – mercy, belonging, brutality, victimhood, war and utopia.


These days, the spectre of ultraviolence remains, however, since mid-April 2015, the target audience has become decidedly more regional, as the motivations behind Islamic State’s brutality have erred away from global provocation towards local deterrence.

He provided some recommendations at the of the interview.

davidbfpo
10-13-2015, 12:40 PM
There is a thread on the Quilliam report and an excellent BBC article by Charlie Winter. It is in the media arena:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/showthread.php?t=22783

JWing
10-14-2015, 02:24 PM
IS confirmed the death of its #2 leader Abu Muslim al-Turkmani in recent audio tape. US said they killed him in a drone strike outside Mosul in August 2015. The problem was this was his 3rd reported death, but now acknowledged by group. Turkmani was second to Baghdadi and in charge of Iraq operations. Read the full report here (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/10/islamic-state-confirms-death-of-its-2nd.html).

JWing
10-16-2015, 02:21 PM
Some more videos I've posted about IS:

INTERNATIONAL PEACE INSTITUTE VIDEO: ISIS Inside The Army of Terror Michael Weiss
(http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/10/international-peace-institute-video.html)

CSIS VIDEO: Degrade And Defeat Examining The Anti-ISIS Strategy (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/10/csis-video-degrade-and-defeat-examining.html)

WORLD AFFAIRS COUNCIL VIDEO: Syria Iraq & Libya What's Next For ISIS? (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/10/world-affairs-council-video-syria-iraq.html)

DUKE VIDEO: ISIS Terrorism At And Abroad Jessica Stern (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/duke-video-isis-terrorism-at-and-abroad.html)

INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR COUNTER-TERRORISM VIDEO: Islamic State Future of Global Jihad? (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/international-institute-for-counter.html)

ASIA SOCIETY VIDEO: ISIS Implications In Asia (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/asia-society-video-isis-implications-in.html)

ATLANTIC COUNCIL VIDEO: When Containing ISIS Fails (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/atlantic-council-video-when-containing.html)

NYU SCHOOL OF LAW VIDEO: Iran, ISIS and the Future of Gulf Security (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/09/nyu-school-of-law-video-iran-isis-and.html)

CSIS: What ISIS Really Wants (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/08/csis-what-isis-really-wants.html)

JWing
10-18-2015, 07:49 PM
MIT VIDEO: ISIS Apocalypse William McCants (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/10/mit-video-isis-apocalypse-william.html)

Will McCants talks about his new book ISIS Apocalypse at MIT.

SWJ Blog
11-03-2015, 01:11 AM
Should The US Deploy Ground Troops Into Direct Combat With ISIS? (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/should-the-us-deploy-ground-troops-into-direct-combat-with-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/should-the-us-deploy-ground-troops-into-direct-combat-with-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
11-05-2015, 09:17 AM
CNAS Announces Formation of ISIS Study Group (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/cnas-announces-formation-of-isis-study-group)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/cnas-announces-formation-of-isis-study-group) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

JWing
11-09-2015, 03:25 PM
Cross posting this over in this thread as well.

I just interviewed Foreign Reports' Matthew Reed about the Islamic State's oil industry. He thinks that the group is mostly selling crude to local refiners in Syria and the Syrian government rather than smuggling it abroad due to local demand and coalition air strikes. Here's a link to the interview (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/11/explaining-islamic-states-oil-industry.html).

SWJ Blog
11-09-2015, 04:19 PM
Daesh Beyond the Levant Symposium (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/daesh-beyond-the-levant-symposium)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/daesh-beyond-the-levant-symposium) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
11-16-2015, 11:26 PM
What Dien Bien Phu Can Teach the French about ISIS and Syria (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/what-dien-bien-phu-can-teach-the-french-about-isis-and-syria)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/what-dien-bien-phu-can-teach-the-french-about-isis-and-syria) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

Bill Moore
11-18-2015, 08:33 AM
An insightful Frontline special on the Islamic State in Afghanistan. They filmed and interviewed an IS member training Afghan children. The virus continues to spread.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/isis-in-afghanistan/

ISIS in Afghanistan

17 NOV 15

davidbfpo
11-18-2015, 01:56 PM
Via Kings of War the author, Jill Sergeant asks a hard question:
how the various parties – local, regional, and global – will move forward when the war machine is defeated.....can we imagine any space for humanity for Iraq’s lost generation swept along by the currents of an abhorrent promise?
Link:http://kingsofwar.org.uk/2015/11/cclkow-iraq-whither-the-soldiers-of-isis/?

A recent article from The Nation is cited:
What I Discovered From Interviewing Imprisoned ISIS Fighters (sub-titled)They’re drawn to the movement for reasons that have little to do with belief in extremist Islam.
Link:http://www.thenation.com/article/what-i-discovered-from-interviewing-isis-prisoners/

For economy of effort this is the key passage:
 These boys came of age under the disastrous American occupation after 2003, in the chaotic and violent Arab part of Iraq, ruled by the viciously sectarian Shia government of Nouri al-Maliki. Growing up Sunni Arab was no fun. A later interviewee described his life growing up under American occupation: He couldn’t go out, he didn’t have a life, and he specifically mentioned that he didn’t have girlfriends. An Islamic State fighter’s biggest resentment was the lack of an adolescence. Another of the interviewees was displaced at the critical age of 13, when his family fled to Kirkuk from Diyala province at the height of Iraq’s sectarian civil war. They are children of the occupation, many with missing fathers at crucial periods (through jail, death from execution, or fighting in the insurgency), filled with rage against America and their own government. They are not fueled by the idea of an Islamic caliphate without borders; rather, ISIS is the first group since the crushed Al Qaeda to offer these humiliated and enraged young men a way to defend their dignity, family, and tribe. This is not radicalization to the ISIS way of life, but the promise of a way out of their insecure and undignified lives; the promise of living in pride as Iraqi Sunni Arabs, which is not just a religious identity but cultural, tribal, and land-based, too.

JWing
11-18-2015, 03:26 PM
Just did a new interview for Musings On Iraq. I talked with Kyle Orton about the role of Baathists in the Islamic State and how Saddam's Faith campaign created a generation of Iraqi Islamists that would joint the insurgency. Here's a link (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/11/what-role-do-iraqi-baathists-play-in.html).

davidbfpo
11-18-2015, 09:32 PM
Thanks to a twitter "lurker" who recommends readers that the free, online publication Perspectives on Terrorism has a special issue on ISIS, including a bibliography:http://www.terrorismanalysts.com/pt/index.php/pot/issue/view/53

JWing
11-19-2015, 06:45 AM
There's some great articles and resources in that issue.

SWJ Blog
11-21-2015, 10:53 PM
Military Reviews U.S. Response to ISIS Rise (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/military-reviews-us-response-to-isis-rise)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/military-reviews-us-response-to-isis-rise) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
11-22-2015, 10:50 PM
Three articles that are worth reading, all were written after Paris:



From Lawfare 'We Were Wrong About ISIS' and the Editor's intro explains:
For over a decade, the Islamic State and its predecessors focused almost exclusively on Iraq, Syria, and their neighbors. The downing of the Russian airplane over the Sinai Peninsula and especially the recent killing spree in Paris suggest that the Islamic State is now going global. Jennifer Williams, long my Lawfare colleague and now at Vox, explains why I and other terrorism experts may have missed this change.Link:https://www.lawfareblog.com/we-were-wrong-about-isis
From Shiraz Maher of ICSR, Kings College 'Why Isis seeks a battle with Western nations - and why it can't be ignored'. Link:http://www.newstatesman.com/world/middle-east/2015/11/why-isis-seeks-battle-western-nations-and-why-it-cant-be-ignored
A long critical commentary in The London Review of Books, worth reading as an alternative narrative. Link:http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n23/adam-shatz/magical-thinking-about-isis

Bill Moore
11-23-2015, 02:00 AM
From Lawfare 'We Were Wrong About ISIS' and the Editor's intro explains:

I'll read the article, but it makes one wonder how people come to these conclusions to begin with? Perhaps the prevailing myth that politics are local? Perhaps it was just was just hope? It also could be part of our pseudo-intellectual cult in the think tanks, where members pretend to be experts by down playing the threat despite all the evidence that point to anything but a localized revolution.

ISIL is spread rapidly to Libya, it is clearly in the Sinai, Boku Haram in West Africa (they have spread beyond Nigeria) is aligned with ISIL, ISIL is in Afghanistan (and their influence is growing there), there are also in Yemen. Beyond that we have foreign fighters joining their ranks from around the world, and now that their operation in France and possibly planned operation in Belgium has finally put to bed the rest that these foreign fighters won't bring trouble back to their countries of origin. We need to watch countries like Indonesia carefully since they have hundreds of foreign fighters in Syria. We're seeing claims of ISIL in Bangladesh, but it seems a bit early to state that is a fact, but evidence is mounting.

Bush was wrong to invade Iraq in my view, but what he did get right after 9/11 is when he said this would be a different kind of war. I think for the most part we appreciate that, but we still don't understand it.

Bill Moore
11-24-2015, 07:08 AM
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/children-of-isis/

An 11 minute special on the children of ISIS.

Below is a link to the transcript

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/children-of-isis/transcript


He says he refused to join and was sentenced to a horrifying
punishment.

OMAR: They gathered the people, they tied my hand and leg. They put my hand on a wooden block, and cut my hand off with a butcher's knife, then cut off my foot and put them in front of me to see.

These photos show Omar's actual amputation, and the man, known as "the Bulldozer," who severed his limbs.

Another lost generation in the making. This reminds me of how the child soldiers in Sierra Leone were coerced into fighting.

JWing
11-24-2015, 05:30 PM
Cross posting this here. Did analysis of security incidents in Iraq from Jan 2014-Oct 2015. Attacks have been going down in country since start of 2014. IS made big offensive in northern Iraq in winter 2014-15 but that failed. Looks like IS has been concentrating upon consolidating its hold upon areas of Iraq it holds rather than trying to seize new territory. Lots of charts and figures. Here's a link (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2015/11/iraq-sees-30-drop-in-violence-in-2015.html).

davidbfpo
11-29-2015, 10:23 PM
Two thoughtful academic articles:

Burning the earth: Isis and the threat to Britain; Nearly 14 years on from the start of the so-called war on terror, the global jihad movement is deepening and expanding by Shiraz Maher (Kings ICSR):http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/uk/2015/11/burning-earth-isis-and-threat-britain
Why ISIL Will Fail on Its Own; As a movement, it’s dangerous. But as a state, it’s collapsing. Here’s how to make that work for us. BY Eli Berman & Jacob Shapiro:http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/11/why-isil-will-fail-on-its-own-21340 (http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/11/why-isil-will-fail-on-its-own-213401)

SWJ Blog
12-01-2015, 08:50 PM
DoD to Deploy ‘Targeting Force’ to Hunt Down ISIS Leaders (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/dod-to-deploy-%E2%80%98targeting-force%E2%80%99-to-hunt-down-isis-leaders)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/dod-to-deploy-%E2%80%98targeting-force%E2%80%99-to-hunt-down-isis-leaders) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
12-02-2015, 03:12 PM
Obama Unleashes Hunter-Killers on ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/obama-unleashes-hunter-killers-on-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/obama-unleashes-hunter-killers-on-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
12-03-2015, 07:38 AM
Panel Casts Doubt on U.S. Propaganda Efforts Against ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/panel-casts-doubt-on-us-propaganda-efforts-against-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/panel-casts-doubt-on-us-propaganda-efforts-against-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
12-07-2015, 02:16 AM
Obama Warns of ‘New Phase’ in Terror Threat, Vows to Destroy ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/obama-warns-of-%E2%80%98new-phase%E2%80%99-in-terror-threat-vows-to-destroy-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/obama-warns-of-%E2%80%98new-phase%E2%80%99-in-terror-threat-vows-to-destroy-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
12-09-2015, 07:00 AM
Lessons of the Past Hint at Hurdles in Fight to Stop ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/lessons-of-the-past-hint-at-hurdles-in-fight-to-stop-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/lessons-of-the-past-hint-at-hurdles-in-fight-to-stop-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
12-09-2015, 04:15 PM
Finding the ISIS Center of Gravity: Why Does It Have to Be So Complicated? (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/finding-the-isis-center-of-gravity-why-does-it-have-to-be-so-complicated)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/finding-the-isis-center-of-gravity-why-does-it-have-to-be-so-complicated) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
12-09-2015, 09:10 PM
Why Air Power Alone Won’t Beat ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/why-air-power-alone-won%E2%80%99t-beat-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/why-air-power-alone-won%E2%80%99t-beat-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
12-22-2015, 05:00 PM
How to Put ISIS on the Run (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/how-to-put-isis-on-the-run)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/how-to-put-isis-on-the-run) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
12-29-2015, 08:39 PM
ISIS is Not a Terrorist Organization (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/isis-is-not-a-terrorist-organization)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/isis-is-not-a-terrorist-organization) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
01-05-2016, 03:03 PM
Defeating ISIS: Just Shoot Him Dad (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/defeating-isis-just-shoot-him-dad)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/defeating-isis-just-shoot-him-dad) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
01-06-2016, 02:47 PM
Sky TV has shown lengthy video clips of an ISIS training college in Raqqa, featuring remote control cars for IEDs and a working thermal battery for SAMs:
The IS research and development team has produced fully working remote controlled cars to act as mobile bombs, while they have fitted the cars with "drivers"; mannequins with self-regulating thermostats to produce the heat signature of humans, allowing the car bombs to evade sophisticated scanning machines that protect military and government buildings in the West.The group trained fighters from a variety of countries to carry out attacks and to train more jihadists in their own countries.The video it is claimed came from:
An IS trainer with more than eight hours of unedited training videos was captured by the remnants of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) as he headed north through Turkey towards Europe. The FSA passed the material to Sky News but was not aware of the importance of the videos, described by a weapons adviser to the British military as an intelligence "gold mine"Link:http://news.sky.com/story/1617197/exclusive-inside-is-terror-weapons-lab

JWing
01-08-2016, 03:18 PM
William McCants going over the main points of his book at a presentation in SF. I think his biggest contribution is his discussion of the culture that IS has created and why it is a draw for people. Here's a link to the video (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2016/01/marines-memorial-club-video-william.html).

davidbfpo
01-08-2016, 08:57 PM
Joel,

Great catch the Will McCants podcast, whose insight I never tire of listening to, even if Iraq has receded from my priority list . This is one of three truly useful posts today and illustrates why SWJ remains useful.

SWJ Blog
01-12-2016, 11:11 PM
ISIS Guide Teaches Jihadis How to Blend In (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-guide-teaches-jihadis-how-to-blend-in)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-guide-teaches-jihadis-how-to-blend-in) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
01-19-2016, 10:13 PM
The Convoluted Coalition Against ISIS (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/the-convoluted-coalition-against-isis)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/the-convoluted-coalition-against-isis) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
01-27-2016, 07:27 AM
ISIS Recruits in the U.S. Legal System (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-recruits-in-the-us-legal-system)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/isis-recruits-in-the-us-legal-system) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
01-29-2016, 01:00 PM
More Is Needed to Beat ISIS, Pentagon Officials Conclude (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/more-is-needed-to-beat-isis-pentagon-officials-conclude)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/more-is-needed-to-beat-isis-pentagon-officials-conclude) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

JWing
01-29-2016, 03:25 PM
Wilson Center video on IS. Features Joby Warrick talking about his new book on IS and Henri Barkey who is an expert on Turkey. Here's a link (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2016/01/wilson-center-video-rise-of-isis-from.html).

JWing
02-02-2016, 03:15 PM
Just wrote an article about Zarqawi's ties with Iran. He operated in the country two times in 2001 & 2003 and set up his first networks running through Iran in 2000 as well. Had the support of the Iranian govt. Here's the piece (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2016/02/irans-ties-with-al-qaeda-in-iraqs-abu.html).

SWJ Blog
02-03-2016, 11:53 PM
To Beat ISIS, We Ought to Try Robotskrieg (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/to-beat-isis-we-ought-to-try-robotskrieg)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/to-beat-isis-we-ought-to-try-robotskrieg) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
02-04-2016, 11:00 AM
Obama Is Pressed to Open Military Front Against ISIS in Libya (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/obama-is-pressed-to-open-military-front-against-isis-in-libya)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/obama-is-pressed-to-open-military-front-against-isis-in-libya) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

JWing
02-25-2016, 04:48 AM
Great article from CTC Sentinel (https://www.ctc.usma.edu/posts/the-military-doctrine-of-the-islamic-state-and-the-limits-of-baathist-influence)on whether Baathists influence Islamic State's military strategy and tactics.

JWing
02-29-2016, 03:17 PM
2 new articles point to IS maintaining its flow of cash via bulk oil sales in Syria and continued access to money exchangers and dollar auctions in Iraq. Group is facing economic crunch but is still attempting counter moves. Here's the article (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2016/02/islamic-state-finding-new-funding-in.html).

davidbfpo
03-04-2016, 12:01 AM
A short article on the supply chain to ISIS to make IEDs:https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2016-03-02/how-isis-makes-ieds

JWing
03-04-2016, 03:24 PM
Back in 2006 journalist Michael Ware was interviewed by PBS's Frontline about the insurgency. He talked about the interaction between Baathists and Zarqawi's group. He mentioned interaction between the two, but it was far from easy to join Al Qaeda in Iraq. Read a short excerpt (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2016/03/baathists-joining-al-qaeda-in-iraq-was.html) on what Ware had to say about former regime elements joining AQI.

davidbfpo
03-07-2016, 12:13 PM
A report from the London-based Quilliam Foundation and two others on this subject; which includes the claim 31k women are pregnant:http://www.quilliamfoundation.org/press/quilliam-releases-report-on-children-in-the-caliphate/

SWJ Blog
03-08-2016, 08:22 PM
Pentagon Has Plan to Cripple ISIS in Libya With Air Barrage (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/pentagon-has-plan-to-cripple-isis-in-libya-with-air-barrage)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/pentagon-has-plan-to-cripple-isis-in-libya-with-air-barrage) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

davidbfpo
03-10-2016, 09:07 AM
Last night Sky News (UK) revealed an 'exclusive':
The files were passed to Sky News on a memory stick stolen from the head of Islamic State's internal security police, an organisation described by insiders as the group's SS. He had been entrusted to protect the organisation's core secrets and he rarely parted with the drive. The man who stole it was a former Free Syrian Army convert to Islamic State who calls himself Abu Hamed. Disillusioned with the Islamic State leadership, he says it has now been taken over by former soldiers from the Iraqi Baath party of Saddam Hussein.
Needless to say the files have been handed over to the 'authorities', although some question why they ran the story, unless of course publicity was delayed.
Link to report:http://news.sky.com/story/1656777/is-registration-forms-identify-22000-jihadis

Or a 5 min TV report:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0EtIzfjlOY

UK SME's assessment of this 'gold mine':http://news.sky.com/story/1656827/islamic-state-files-goldmine-of-information

Digging deeper into the origin:
The forms showing the 23-question survey in Arabic were previously published online by Zaman Al Wasl (https://en.zamanalwsl.net/news/14541.html), a pro-opposition Syrian news website.
Link:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/from-blood-type-to-special-skillsfrom-blood-type-to-special-skills-the-23-questions-asked-to-a6921881.html

What do the forms reveal or confirm IMHO? Zaman Al Wasl say:
Two thirds of ISIS manpower are from Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Morocco and Egypt. 25% of ISIS fighters are Saudis....Syrians are just 1.7 % of the total number of fighters. The Iraqis make 1.2.
Link which has original documents in Arabic:https://en.zamanalwsl.net/news/14541.html?

davidbfpo
03-10-2016, 12:56 PM
A number of SME have reservations, here is Charlie Winter:
There would be big alarm bells for me, because when I've seen inconsistencies like that in the past they've been on really shoddily made forgeries...The biggest concerns, were the different names, logo, and grammatical mistakes that he described as "very much out of character" for IS documents. With something as important as this, it's important to look at it with as suspicious, discerning, and cynical an eye as possible...Link:http://www.globalpost.com/article/6744414/2016/03/10/inconsistencies-leaked-files-sound-alarm-bells

Or the BBC's take:
The documents were clearly not intended for public consumption, so those who drafted the questionnaire may not have paid as much attention to detail as for public documents. And they should be compared not with IS documents of today, but of around two years ago, when they appear to originate - before the group's rapid land grab across northern Iraq and Syria, when its bureaucracy and administrative capabilities were less well developed.

Link:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-35773649

davidbfpo
03-10-2016, 10:12 PM
A cascade of comments now. The NYT reports these documents have been around awhile inside Turkey and that the German press got them first, handing them onto their agencies:http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/11/world/europe/germany-isis-list.html?_r=0

The Guardian's regional expert has a sensible overview:http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/10/isis-document-leak-could-offer-up-vignettes-but-not-key-secrets

JWing
03-11-2016, 03:24 PM
2002 US Joint Chiefs drew up plan to attack Ansar al-Islam camp in Iraq's Kurdistan that was hosting Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. White House decided to pass on attack because could've derailed Iraq invasion. Missed opportunity to kill Zarqawi before he led to Al Qaeda in Iraq and eventually the Islamic State. Here's the article (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2016/03/how-us-missed-opportunity-to-kill.html).

JWing
03-11-2016, 03:37 PM
More on the skepticism on the docs. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/10/intelligence-agents-scour-cache-isis-documents

SWJ Blog
03-12-2016, 03:49 PM
To Maintain Supply of Sex Slaves, ISIS Pushes Birth Control (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/to-maintain-supply-of-sex-slaves-isis-pushes-birth-control)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/to-maintain-supply-of-sex-slaves-isis-pushes-birth-control) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
03-16-2016, 12:14 AM
Could Iran and the US Overcome Their Mutual Animosity to Eradicate Daesh? (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/could-iran-and-the-us-overcome-their-mutual-animosity-to-eradicate-daesh)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/could-iran-and-the-us-overcome-their-mutual-animosity-to-eradicate-daesh) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

JWing
03-16-2016, 08:17 PM
Testimony to British parliament said IS still buying dollars at Central Bank of Iraq auctions and then re-selling them for a profit. Estimated that IS was making $20-$25 mil/month. Here's a link to the article (http://musingsoniraq.blogspot.com/2016/03/more-on-islamic-states-participation-in.html).

SWJ Blog
03-20-2016, 09:21 PM
Death of U.S. Marine in Iraq Highlights Use of Troops from Navy Ships in ISIS War (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/death-of-us-marine-in-iraq-highlights-use-of-troops-from-navy-ships-in-isis-war)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/death-of-us-marine-in-iraq-highlights-use-of-troops-from-navy-ships-in-isis-war) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
03-23-2016, 08:51 PM
Defeats in Mideast Raise ISIS Threat to the West (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/defeats-in-mideast-raise-isis-threat-to-the-west)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/defeats-in-mideast-raise-isis-threat-to-the-west) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
03-23-2016, 10:36 PM
The DAESH Health System: An Open Source Intel Report (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/the-daesh-health-system-an-open-source-intel-report)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/the-daesh-health-system-an-open-source-intel-report) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.

SWJ Blog
03-25-2016, 03:21 PM
US Attack in Syria Kills ISIS Heir Apparent, Pentagon Says (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/us-attack-in-syria-kills-isis-heir-apparent-pentagon-says)

Entry Excerpt:



--------
Read the full post (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/us-attack-in-syria-kills-isis-heir-apparent-pentagon-says) and make any comments at the SWJ Blog (http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog).
This forum is a feed only and is closed to user comments.