Foreign fighters in Iraq & Syria

[Tukhachevskii]

Carl, actually it is you espousing ideological nonsense. I tolerate your binded shots in my general direction, and I realize many are equally as ideolgogically blinded as yourself and agree in large part with your baseless positions. That does not make those positions correct.

In many ways you are a microcosm of post Cold War US national security strategy, becoming increasingly ideological ourselves to the point where we perceive ourselves to be existentially threatened merely because some other ideolog believes differently.

Personally I am cautious of all ideologs, regardless of their espoused creed. I prefer those who think, seek to understand, and then speak or act; over those who memorize, recite and perform.

These are political struggles. When one loses sight of that reality and over-focuses on "the lipstick" (to borrow your phrase) one forgets its all about the pig. And that pig is politics; and the political competition is driven by fundamental human nature, not fundamentalist ideology. Those denied legal redress will take illegal redress. It is what humans have always done and will always do.

...to this nonsense. Political preferences are non ideiological? Ever hear of the spanish civil war? So politics is purely proceducral? I take it these people travel abroad to risk their lives for such administrative or procedural political goals as wether or not the central government should pick up household rubiish on Tuesday instead of Wednesday? Its crap like this that simply turned me off SWC. Bobs worls and I have debated before. Right now I just can't be bothered. Politics is not ideological?!! Thank god this site doesnt require a subscription.

[davidbfpo]

ICSR @ Kings has published this research paper today:

An analysis of social media has shown what a selection of foreign fighters in Syria are liking, following and interacting with. What are their key online influences?....The analysis identifies two relatively unknown clerics who have been acting as online cheerleaders for fighters seeking to topple President Bashar al-Assad. It also identifies a new breed of 'disseminators' advising and supporting the men and women who have joined rebel groups. Two preachers, Ahmad Musa Jibril (US-based) and Musa Cerantonio (based in Australia)

From a short article:http://www.theguardian.com/news/data...ighters-syria?


An eight minute video:http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/v...al-media-video


The report via:http://icsr.info/2014/04/icsr-insigh...eign-fighters/

[davidbfpo]

A short paper by the London-based Institute for Strategic Dialogue 'Foreign Fighters, the Challenge of Counter-Narratives', after the introduction a refreshing attempt to consider and provide a counter-narrative. Sadly it has taken three years, with speculation / reporting that hundreds are fighting in Syria and an estimated two hundred and fifty have returned to the UK.

Link:http://www.strategicdialogue.org/For...bsite_v0.6.pdf

[Firn]

Brussels Jewish Museum killings: Suspect 'admitted attack'

He said Mr Nemmouche had spent over a year in Syria and had links with radical Islamists.

....

Police found Mr Nemmouche had in his possession a Kalashnikov rifle and a handgun believed to have been used in the attack, the Paris prosecutor told a news conference on Sunday.

With the weapons was a white sheet emblazoned with the name of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, a jihadist group fighting in Syria, according to Mr Molins.

He was also sentenced to 5 years for armed robbery, it seems, before going to Syria. Arguably a second marker beside the Syria trip which caused monitoring activities. Similar connections (minus the terrorism at home, so far) have been already mentioned in this thread. This nexus and his criminal past might have facilitated the access to those guns, we will see. There will be lots of question in France, especially within the services.

Mr Nemmouche was also said to be carrying a camera with a 40-second video showing the two guns and a voice recording, claiming responsibility for the killings and expressing regret that the device had not succeeded in capturing the shooting.

Maybe influenced by the Syrian YTwar, in which such cameras are widely used for various reasons, propaganda being not the least among them.

[davidbfpo]

A short, six minute CNN interview with Peter Neumann from ICSR and he is very pessimistic about teh impact of foreign fighters. This quote comes after his direct contact with fighters:

They are telling us that the Syrian people do not like them very much. They are telling us that they hate the idea that all this infighting is going on between different groups – they came to Syria in order to fight Bashar Assad; what they end up doing is killing other Sunni rebels. And so there are a lot of powerful messages. If governments paid more attention, these would be very powerful messages to deter people from going to Syria in the first place

Link:http://amanpour.blogs.cnn.com/2014/0...stan-in-1980s/

[davidbfpo]

An update on the French scene:http://jihadology.net/2014/06/09/the...eers-in-syria/

For David Thomson, the French jihadists are leaving to assume a defensive jihad against the regime of Bashar al-Assad, but also because they believe in the Muslim prophecies of the end times, the Apocalypse, to be held in Syria (land of Sham). There is no portrait type of French jihadist even if some are from disadvantaged neighborhoods of large cities, others come from the countryside and have never met a Muslim. Many are offenders, but not all, some being fully inserted into the social fabric. The only common denominator is the role of the Internet and social networks. These helped to streamline the message of jihad and extend it to a wider younger audience. Most of the jihadists become self-taught via the net

[davidbfpo]

Amidst a longer story, IMHO fear-mongering, is this passage:

Security officials estimate that about two-thirds of those have already returned.

Link:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz36h0sNQoY

[davidbfpo]

One of the better press articles on why three Britons left for Syria. A complex and unpredictable mixture:http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...randeep-ramesh

A shorter Canadian report:http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/07...dists-at-home/

[Bill Moore]

Light infantry and special operators will be very familiar with these battle drills. You can critique their tactics at the margins, but overall they appear to be well trained, some of the tactics/battle drills demonstrated include man down drills, react to contact, bounding overwatch, how to execute an ambush, etc.

These are reportedly foreign fighters being trained in Syria. Apparently using our books.

http://www.longwarjournal.org/archiv...st_group_i.php

Chechen-led jihadist group in Syria releases video of training camp

A new jihadist group known as the Jamaat Ahadun Ahad, or the Group of the One and Only, has released a video of its training camp in Syria. The group is led by a Chechen commander and includes fighters from Chechnya, Europe, Turkey, Afghanistan, Pakistan and several Arab countries.

[davidbfpo]

An unclassified Danish Security Service (PET) Center for Terror Analysis has published:

...a 6-page unclassified intelligence threat assessment on the danger posed by foreign fighters currently operating in Syria with various militant groups, especially ISIS.

The report discloses that more than 100 Danes are currently believed to be fighting with these militant groups in Syria, and that 15 have been killed. The report also notes that a small but growing number of Danes are now leaving home to fight with ISIS in Iraq.

Link:https://www.pet.dk/English/Centerfor...nFINALpdf.ashx

[SWJ Blog]

From the Guy Next Door to the Fighter Overseas: A Look at Four Foreign Fighters who Joined the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

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[SWJ Blog]

A Ticket to Turkey and a Desire to Fight: Why Some Foreign Fighters Travel to Syria

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[Bill Moore]

http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/res...d%20%20web.pdf

Be Afraid.
Be A Little Afraid:
The Threat of Terrorism from
Western Foreign Fighters in Syria
and Iraq

This paper first lays out the standard schematic view
of how and why some foreign fighters become dangerous
terrorists, drawing on the Afghanistan experience
in the 1980s to illustrate the arguments. The
second section discusses why many seasoned observers
believe the Syria conflict is likely to be particularly
dangerous. In the third section, we examine
why terrorism in Europe and the United States was
less than expected from previous jihads such as Iraq,
again drawing implications and lessons specific to
Syria, as well as examining factors unique to the Syrian
conflict itself. The fourth and final section identifies
policy implications and recommendations.

[davidbfpo]

The latest ICSR estimate:

The number of foreigners that have joined Sunni militant organizations in the Syria/Iraq conflict continues to rise. According to ICSR’s latest estimate, the total now exceeds 20,000 – of which nearly a fifth were residents or nationals of Western European countries.

Link to short document:http://icsr.info/2015/01/foreign-fig...onflict-1980s/

[SWJ Blog]

How Many Fighters Does the Islamic State Really Have?

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[SWJ Blog]

Petraeus: Use Al Qaeda Fighters to Beat ISIS

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[SWJ Blog]

Global Efforts Fail to Stem Flow of Foreign Fighters to Syria, Iraq

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[davidbfpo]

I have altered the thread's title from Foreign Fighters in Syria: a crime minus a motive? to simply Foreign Fighters in Iraq & Syria.

A couple of small threads have been merged in too.

There is a parallel thread: Foreign Fighters: preventative action (UK mainly)

An older, larger thread, which I have now closed:Today's Wild Geese: Foreign Fighters in the GWOT

[davidbfpo]

A succinct Soufan Group briefing note, the keypoint IMHO is:

Both the UN and U.S. estimates find that nearly 30,000 people have traveled to Syria; the monthly rate of 1,000 remains unchanged

Link:http://soufangroup.com/tsg-intelbrie...eign-fighters/

Their argument is weakened by no mention of the recent ICSR report and nowt on those who change their mind.

[davidbfpo]

The latest Soufan Group report, which going by Twitter is getting plaudits and their main point is:

In the 18 months since The Soufan Group released its initial report on foreign fighters in Syria, the numbers of people going to fight in Syria have more than doubled, from an estimated 12,000 to between 27,000 and 31,000

Link:http://soufangroup.com/tsg-intelbrie...ers-an-update/

Twitter indicates the full report has many graphs etc.