Bill - agreed with all your main points. They've showed they can defeat their adversaries, and that's what counts. Short of the fall of Baghdad, a MEU or a US armored division is not coming over the horizon.

I think that one of the main things that requires research is ISIL's ability to maintain C4IR and logistics across a very large battlespace in the face of US airpower. Right now I don't think anyone outside of ISIL's command structure itself and maybe the US Gov really knows just how autonomous the different emirs or regions are, or how ISIL's internal supply network works. That they managed to sustain combat in Kobane as long as they did in the face of crippling strikes was pretty impressive to me, even if they did retreat in the end.

That ISIL shows the sort of internal cohesion and leadership to outmatch the Iraqi government, as feeble as that task may be, shows just how important those two qualities are in the face of billions of dollars in aid and equipment.

I think Iraq is in the process of forming a genuine national identity that can command real loyalty to a nation irrespective of governmental identity. Unfortunately this appears to have an exclusively Shia Arab phenomenon at the moment. Not sure where this goes in the end - probably not towards the sort of Iraq we wanted in 2003.