R2P or is this an intervention coming?
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...e-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/commen.../#.U-t10aORcdW
His sub-title is:
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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.
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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';
- Some combination thereof.
Why does Isis hate us so much?
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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/...h-9664506.html
Why does Isis hate us so much? Part 2
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/sh...eading-people/
He tries to answer this:
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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?
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:
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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 “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.
James Foley, Islamic State and the imagery of death...
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.
How does ISIS fight? Some infographics
A previously unheard of website, so maybe some caution. Their explanation for the data presented:
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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-wo...ge=all#!bHpDun
Why ISIS Is So Terrifyingly Effective at Seducing New Recruits
A short, detailed article based on an interview of Professor John Horgan, a British psychologist now @ UMass-Lowell:http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2014/08...-recruits.html
A key point:
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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?
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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.
Beyond the frontline: watching ISIS
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-fr...-state-mccants
Don’t give ISIS its “Far Enemy"
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’?
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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/201...siss-far-enemy
One leader, One authority, One mosque: submit to it, or be killed
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/alasta..._5717157.html?
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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:
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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?