Quote Originally Posted by Dayuhan View Post
Two things here stand out to me...



The problem here is that regional governments will co-opt the plan to advance their own divisive agendas. That's inevitable, and there is no realistic way that the US or anyone else can prevent it.



This goes back to the argument from governance. It's an appealing argument in some ways: it is certainly true that if these countries were well governed, many of these problems would be much easier to manage. It's also a distinctly frustrating argument, because these countries are not well governed, and the US can neither govern them nor compel them to change the way they govern themselves.
Well written, I have debated this with Bob's World on a number of occasions. His general premise seems to ring true, but where it fails in my opinion as a solution is in two key areas. First there seldom a collective entity known as the people or populace. Good governance to one group will be considered poor governance by another. This is a fact of life in most countries. The second area you addressed which is we have limited means to compel any government to actually govern more effectively. At the end of the day it seems that understanding the failures and the consequences of poor governance are important to gain understanding/context, but if is there is something that threatens our interest that resides in that country, improving governance is seldom going to reduce that threat in a timely manner. Shaping governance through engagement certainly isn't without merit, and in some cases it can be more effective than others based on a number of variables, but to assume we can always address root causes seems a bit hubristic to me. We still need to pursue options to manage threats that fall short of fixing governance, but in a way that doesn't make the problem worse. That is where the art comes in, and one can't be a good artist without understanding the subject.

Break

NightWatch had some interesting comments in their daily e-mail that came out last night. Can't find a web link to this report. I have no other sources to validate or refute this, but NightWatch is a respected open source intelligence service. For your consideration.

Comment on car bombs in Baghdad, which supports my hypothesis that ISIL/ISIS may actually be less of a threat when configured as a military force controlling terrain than a traditional terrorist organization. We certainly have the means to make quick work of any ISIL/ISIS conventional capability and probably should, but then what?

Comment: The efforts by the Islamist extremists to terrorize Shiite neighborhoods and probe for weaknesses in Iraqi security continue. They are impervious to the announced US campaign because the bombers mingle among the civilian population. Suicide and other bombings will continue.
Does anyone else have other reports validating this claim?

Reaction to the US President's speech. The so-called moderate Syrian Islamists announced that they are allied to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). That destroys any expectations that moderate Muslims would work with the US effort.
Sounds like 2003 all over again.

Turkey announced that the US cannot use any of its bases or resources in fighting ISIL Turkey also will permit no US soldiers in Turkey for the purpose of fighting ISIL.
CIA announced that the upper limit of ISIL fighting strength is 31,500. This number is significantly higher than the number used earlier in the week. The nature of the fight continues to escalate.