America Must Pummel Islamic State

From Colin Dueck and Roger Zakheim, at the National Interest, "Unleashed: America Must Pummel ISIS":

The rise of ISIS, together with its demonstrated brutality, have triggered a sea-change in American popular attitudes, at least on this particular issue. One Quinnipiac poll from March 4 found that 62 percent of all Americans now support the use of U.S. ground troops versus ISIS, as against only 30 percent who oppose. So a two-to-one majority of U.S. public opinion today supports not only the use of force, but the use of American ground troops against the Islamic State. The majorities supporting U.S. airstrikes are even more overwhelming.

One suspects that President Obama, his core supporters, and many of his inner circle find this fierce and unexpected response from the U.S. public toward ISIS rather terrifying. Isn't this the sort of characteristically American, "cowboy" foreign policy reaction Obama was elected to suppress?

Well, yes—and he's doing his best to suppress it. That's what the restrictions on the proposed use of force authorization are supposed to do.

Obama says that his goal is to "degrade, and ultimately destroy ISIS," because Americans insist that he say so. But as so often internationally, his actions have hardly matched his words. As former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates made clear, the policy tools Obama has so far authorized against ISIS in no way match the goal of that group's destruction.

There has been a limited U.S. campaign against ISIS for several months now. It has helped to blunt the group's advance. But in terms of seriously rolling back or destroying ISIS, realistically there is no such prospect on the horizon given current U.S. policies. A key U.S. ally, Jordan, in particular is in grave danger.

Most congressional Republicans would like to see U.S. efforts against ISIS escalated, so that the terror state is rolled back rather than simply contained. And they are honest enough to admit this will require more U.S. troops on the ground.

Obama has actually already placed over 2,000 American troops on the ground since this crisis began last year, including Special Operations troops, to help train and advise Iraqi government forces in their fight against ISIS.

But judging by his actions, the fixed point in Obama's thinking is not so much the destruction of ISIS, as the avoidance of another American ground war in the region. And in fact he says as much. He wants to be given credit for believing in the long-term destruction of ISIS. He wants to avoid another ground war, and he wants credit for that too, especially with his political base. He wants congressional Republican approval for whatever language he puts forward. Yet, he simultaneously wants to be able to accuse those same Republicans of favoring the dreaded "boots on the ground”—even though there are already U.S. boots on the ground in Iraq by his own orders.

In other words the president's main objection to robust Republican criticism of his proposed use of force is, in effect, that such criticism is insufficiently disingenuous, as well as politically inconvenient for him.

Not exactly Abraham Lincoln.

But how should Republicans respond? What would an effective American strategy against ISIS look like?

Great piece. Keep reading.

Syrians are a Nation of Terrorist Supporters

From Daniel Greenfield, at FrontPage Magazine, "10,000 Syrian refugees mean 1,300 ISIS supporters":

Syria is a terror state. It didn’t become that way overnight because of the Arab Spring or the Iraq War.

Its people are not the victims of American foreign policy, Islamic militancy or any of the other fashionable excuses. They supported Islamic terrorism. Millions of them still do.

They are not the Jews fleeing a Nazi Holocaust. They are the Nazis trying to relocate from a bombed out Berlin.

These are the cold hard facts.

ISIS took over parts of Syria because its government willingly allied with it to help its terrorists kill Americans in Iraq. That support for Al Qaeda helped lead to the civil war tearing the country apart.

The Syrians were not helpless, apathetic pawns in this fight. They supported Islamic terrorism.

A 2007 poll showed that 77% of Syrians supported financing Islamic terrorists including Hamas and the Iraqi fighters who evolved into ISIS. Less than 10% of Syrians opposed their terrorism.

Why did Syrians support Islamic terrorism? Because they hated America.

Sixty-three percent wanted to refuse medical and humanitarian assistance from the United States. An equal number didn’t want any American help caring for Iraqi refugees in Syria.

The vast majority of Syrians turned down any form of assistance from the United States because they hated us. They still do. Just because they’re willing to accept it now, doesn’t mean they like us.

If we bring Syrian Muslims to America, we will be importing a population that hates us.

The terrorism poll numbers are still ugly. A poll this summer found that 1 in 5 Syrians supports ISIS.  A third of Syrians support the Al Nusra Front, which is affiliated with Al Qaeda. Since Sunnis are 3/4rs of the population and Shiites and Christians aren’t likely to support either group, this really means that Sunni Muslim support for both terror groups is even higher than these numbers make it seem.

And even though Christians and Yazidis are the ones who actually face ISIS genocide, Obama has chosen to take in few Christians and Yazidis. Instead 98.6% of Obama’s Syrian refugees are Sunni Muslims.

This is also the population most likely to support ISIS and Al Qaeda.

But these numbers are even worse than they look. Syrian men are more likely to view ISIS positively than women. This isn’t surprising as the Islamic State not only practices sex slavery, but has some ruthless restrictions for women that exceed even those of Saudi Arabia.  (Al Qaeda’s Al Nusra Front, however, mostly closes the gender gap getting equal support from Syrian men and women.)

ISIS, however, gets its highest level of support from young men. This is the Syrian refugee demographic.

In the places where the Syrian refugees come from, support for Al Qaeda groups climbs as high as 70% in Idlib, 66% in Quneitra, 66% in Raqqa, 47% in Derzor, 47% in Hasakeh, 41% in Daraa and 41% in Aleppo.

Seventy percent support for ISIS in Raqqa has been dismissed as the result of fear. But if Syrians in the ISIS capital were just afraid of the Islamic State, why would the Al Nusra Front, which ISIS is fighting, get nearly as high a score from the people in Raqqa? The answer is that their support for Al Qaeda is real.

Apologists will claim that these numbers don’t apply to the Syrian refugees. It’s hard to say how true that is. Only 13% of Syrian refugees will admit to supporting ISIS, though that number still means that of Obama’s first 10,000 refugees, 1,300 will support ISIS. But the poll doesn’t delve into their views of other Al Qaeda groups, such as the Al Nusra Front, which usually gets more Sunni Muslim support.

And there’s no sign that they have learned to reject Islamic terrorism and their hatred for America...

Still more.

#ISIS is Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's Dream Come True in Iraq

The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) is not an "offshoot" or an "affiliate" of al-Qaeda in Iraq. It is al-Qaeda in Iraq, updated and expanded into Syria, with new leadership at the helm. Very few media outlets have resisted using the false characterization of ISIS as an abandoned stepchild of Ayman al Zawahiri. At most there's a leadership quarrel at the top levels of organization, without which no one would be saying how much more horrible is ISIS than al-Qaeda. It's a stupid and malicious program of downplaying the evil and significance of al-Qaeda's global jihad. IBD is one of the few outlets that truly gets it, as seen in its piece the other day, "#ISIS Coming to America: 'See You in New York'."

However, this morning's Los Angeles Times does an excellent job of putting ISIS in the context of al-Qaeda's religious and ideological program for the global holy war. See, "Long-dead militant's battle plan resurrected in Iraq":

ISIS in many ways seems better equipped for a long, complex insurgency than its precursor organization of a decade ago, Zarqawi's Al Qaeda in Iraq. Rebranded as the Islamic State of Iraq after Zarqawi was killed in a U.S. airstrike in 2006, the group exploited a U.S. military occupation to rally its fighters. Its current incarnation has railed against the Iraqi government that was formed during the U.S. occupation and has been led by Prime Minister Nouri Maliki, a Shiite who critics say has systematically marginalized minority Sunnis.

Now headed by Abu Bakr Baghdadi, a reclusive former teacher, the group added Syria to its name to reflect its widening ambitions. In March 2013, ISIS seized the Syrian city of Raqqah, the first provincial capital it held, and by taking several more cities in eastern Syria over the last year the group has gained what Zarqawi wanted but never had: a safe haven in which to hide fighters and plot major operations.

In his 2004 letter to Al Qaeda leadership, Zarqawi lamented his inability to invite large numbers of foreign Islamic militants to Iraq to help fight U.S. and Iraqi forces.

"What prevents us from [calling] a general alert is that the country has no mountains in which we can take refuge and no forests in whose thickets we can hide," he wrote. "Our backs are exposed and our movements compromised."

Thanks to its conquests in Syria, analysts say, ISIS has become a magnet for foreign radicals, particularly from Europe. The influx of eager fighters has allowed the group to dramatically increase the pace of its attacks in Iraq over the last 18 months even as it continues to battle President Bashar Assad's troops in Syria.

Read the whole thing at the link.

Remember, Zarqawi personally beheaded numerous hostages and al-Qaeda in Iraq gained notorious propaganda victories by posted those to online videos, an early exploitation of social media, before Twitter was invented. Bare Naked Islam has Zarqawi's execution of American contractor Nicholas Berg here, "AMERICAN ‘Leftist’ NICK BERG’S BEHEADING (WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES)." Today's mass beheadings by ISIS forces advancing toward Baghdad are not new, only a more widespread campaign of terror that has been the hallmark of al-Qaeda's totalitarian jihad.

Al-Qaeda in Iraq's leadership struggle began in 2005, when Zawahiri wrote a letter to Zarqawi warning against building flamboyant "cults of personality," though seeking compromise on the organization's ideological program. See Long War Journal, "Dear Zarqawi: A Letter from Zawahiri, and a Constitutional Compromise." And that is key: Today ISIS in Iraq is securing the Islamic caliphate that has been the stated goal of al-Qaeda since the days of Osama bin Laden. See Walid Phares on that, for example, "Bin Laden’s Dream of a Caliphate Lives On," and Tara Servatius, "The Realization of Osama bin Laden's Dream."

In 2011, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger warned that the Arab Spring revolution would bring the most fundamental change in international politics "we have known since World War Two." In Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood came to power following the elections of June 2012, but was later ousted when the military toppled the government of Mohamed Morsi last year. But now with ISIS establishing a quasi-state stretching from Raqqah in Syria to Mosul in Iraq and beyond, Zarqawi's dream of the Islamic caliphate is coming to fruition, as brutal as ever, and with an endless supply of jihadists ready to die in the name of Allah.

ALLAHU AKBAR! — #ISIS Declares Creation of Middle East Caliphate: 'New Era of International Jihad'

At RT, "ISIS declares creation of Islamic state in Middle East, 'new era of international jihad'."

And at the Wall Street Journal, "ISIS Declares New Islamist Caliphate: Militant Group Declares Statehood, Demands Allegiance From Other Organizations."

BREAKING: #ISIS declares Caliphate, All muslims according to Sharia & hadith must give allegiance
— Al-Janabi #باقية (@AbuBakrAl_Janab) June 29, 2014

More at Jihad Watch, "ISIS/ISIL declares Islamic State, shortens name to “The Islamic State” (IS)":

They clearly intend to hold the territory they have captured. They’ve also declared Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi the new caliph; he claims to be a descendant of Muhammad, so it is possible that if they can make their state viable, this claim will gain currency. If that happens, it will be interesting to see how Muslims in the West react to the idea that he is the “leader for Muslims everywhere,” which historically was always a claim of the caliph.

Plus, an English-language ISIS propaganda video, "The End of Sykes - Picot":



Meanwhile, the blood continues to spill, at RT, "ISIS crucify eight anti-Assad fighters in Syria – watchdog."

More news on Twitter:

Muslims express their happiness over the declaration of the Islamic Caliphate. Photo is from Raqqa, Syria #ISIS pic.twitter.com/xljmGKLhnF
— ابنة الشيخ البغدادي© (@MujaahidaHafy) June 29, 2014

The caliphate was abolished when the Ottoman empire collapsed in 1924. May Allah allow us to now see it again, a unified & real one. #ISIS
— ابنة الشيخ البغدادي© (@MujaahidaHafy) June 29, 2014

The Khilafah has been reestablished. Saudi's reaction pic.twitter.com/7tuI1njmaB
— ﷲ MILLATU IBRAHIM ﷲ (@RadicalIslamist) June 29, 2014

#Syria: the Husba car on patrol in celebration of the announcement of Caliphate: pic.twitter.com/Al4ZhZNsY3
— Aymenn J Al-Tamimi (@ajaltamimi) June 29, 2014

Alhamdulilah. What a HISTORIC moment, shivers run down my spine hearing the announcement of the Islamic Caliphate- #KHILAFAH #ISLAMIC_STATE.
— ابويحيي الصومال (@AbuYahya_Somal) June 29, 2014

The Kuffar, Murtadin and Munafiqin have been preventing the rebirth of the Caliphate for years! DIE IN YOUR RAGE! The Khilafa has returned!
— Abu Yazan (@UtopianIslamist) June 29, 2014

Citizens of the Islamic state in the street partying after the proclamation of the Caliphate pic.twitter.com/OGQndPD6p4"
— Ak47 (@afaqbeig) June 29, 2014

Al Jazeera from Baghdad: "a caliphate is effectively an Islamic Republic led by one leader, regardless of national boundaries." #ISIS
— ابنة الشيخ البغدادي© (@MujaahidaHafy) June 29, 2014

#Palestine old woman cries after Zionist Rat's bulldozed her house.#Israel will be destroyed #IS coming for you pic.twitter.com/cJWjRF8jDB"
— Ak47 (@afaqbeig) June 29, 2014

A message from the Islamic Khilafa to all Jihadi groups worldwide who fight for tawhid #IS #Syria #Iraq pic.twitter.com/pb5e7Gtr3R
— Al-Janabi #باقية (@AbuBakrAl_Janab) June 29, 2014

This Is the Promise of Allah An announcement by Ash-Sheikh Abu Muhammad Adnaani http://t.co/wXR1xiXMzV #CaliphateRestored #KhilafaRestored"
— Ak47 (@afaqbeig) June 29, 2014

ISIS claims its spokesman AlAdnani was himself at #Syria #Iraq border demolishing official international borders pic.twitter.com/xepbOAaWuM
— Jenan Moussa (@jenanmoussa) June 29, 2014

Officials and Military Experts: Iraq Forces Can't Defeat #ISIS Jihadists

For the left's antiwar hordes, these reports should be the "uh oh" moment. Because as much as the administration wants to stay out, pressure to avoid an ISIS takeover of Baghdad, and revulsion at the unequivocal waste of U.S. sacrifice in the country, is going to hurt the Democrats in public opinion. The 300 "advisers" could be just the beginning of a renewed robust role for the U.S. in Iraq. It is, in a sense, like a quagmire, and Obama has a tough choice even as he outwardly sticks to his meme that we won the war and his decision to wind it down was a good one.

At the Wall Street Journal, "Iraq Army's Ability to Fight Raises Worries: U.S. Says Decline of Local Forces Leaves Country Vulnerable to Sunni Insurgents, Who Gained Key Border Crossings on Sunday":

The Iraq army's quick collapse against Sunni insurgents in Mosul this month surprised the U.S. military, which spent about $25 billion to train and supply the army over nearly a decade of occupation until 2011.

But it didn't surprise Mosul's residents, who say they witnessed the Iraqi army's decay through corruption, sectarianism and incompetence.  Before the conquest, the city's mostly Sunni residents said they lived under a Shiite-dominant military regime that behaved like an occupying army—extorting protection money from local businesses and motorists and detaining those who refused, the residents said.

"It was as if everyone was cooperating to eradicate the people of Mosul," said Mahmoud Attaie, a dentist who lived in the city until the Islamist State of Iraq and al-Sham, or ISIS, arrived this month.

Now, as ISIS seems intent on attacking Baghdad and important Shiite pilgrimage cities south of Iraq's capital, U.S. and Iraqi military leaders say they worry Iraqi forces will once again collapse.  The U.S. discovered significant problems as it stepped up its assessment of Iraq's security forces in recent months, American officials said. They say they noted that more competent Sunni military tacticians in units in the north had been forced out by the Shiite-dominated government.

Across the military U.S. military personnel found the Iraqis were failing to properly maintain equipment. Training standards have declined sharply from 2011, when U.S. military forces advised Iraqi units.

The ISIS insurgents "are not strong, but the military is very weak," said Atheel Al Nujaifi, the governor of Nineveh province who said he fled its capital Mosul in the middle of the night on June 10 before the city fell. "There was no responsible leadership, there was no planning, there was no correct utilization for the military tools."

"The leaders and the soldiers have no military experience and have no convictions," he added.  Instead, the Iraqi command that ran Mosul by direct order of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ruled the city like a fief, Mr. Nujaifi and other residents said.

"They are not an army, they just take money. No more," said a local Sunni militant in Mosul who said he fought alongside ISIS. "They don't care about orders, weapons or vehicles. They are paid just to get money."

Given how Iraqi soldiers departed without staging any defense of Mosul, the city's residents, as well as Iraqi and U.S. officials, speculate that former operations commander Mahdi Al Gharawi and his lieutenants sold the city to the conquering Islamist militants.

Spokesmen for the military, which has relieved Mr. Gharawi of his command, and for Mr. Maliki didn't respond to requests for comment.

Still, U.S. and Iraqi officials acknowledge that Iraqi soldiers may also have fled under the belief that Mosul's residents would have risen up against them. That scenario, these people say, complicates any possibility of Iraqi security forces—or the Shiite militias that are forming in Baghdad and other Iraqi cities to fight ISIS's Sunni militants—from retaking Mosul and nearby towns.

"If the Shiite militias and the military come to Mosul, all the people of Mosul will fight them," Mr. Nujaifi said. "The people are afraid of the militias and the army now more than they were afraid of ISIS."

The threat to Baghdad grew on Sunday as ISIS insurgents swept through towns in western Iraq and overran the Turaibil border outpost with Jordan and the al-Walid crossing with Syria, a day after they took the Syrian border crossing of al Qaim, security officials said. They faced little resistance from Iraqi national security soldiers, many of whom left their posts.

The assaults bolstered ISIS's cross-border supply lines with Syria and could serve the group's goal of carving out an Islamic state from the Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf.

Military spokesman Gen. Qassim Atta disputed reports that Iraqi forces had abandoned their positions on the Iraq's western border, saying that the army tactically pulled out of the area to regroup and attack insurgents from the east.

This year, Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, the main U.S. foreign military espionage agency, noted the Iraqi security forces had been unable to stop rising violence or suppress militant activity in Iraq's Sunni-dominated areas.

"Iraqi military and police forces lack cohesion, are undermanned, and are poorly trained, equipped, and supplied," Gen. Flynn said in February. "This leaves them vulnerable to terrorist attack, infiltration and corruption."

The Pentagon said it has seen apparent improvements in the performance of the Iraqi military in recent days of fighting against Sunni militants, but many officials still said they harbor concerns over whether the forces can defend the capital.

Units stationed near Baghdad, U.S. defense officials said, are better trained and possess more motivation to fight and defend the capital from ISIS's Sunni militants than forces positioned in Sunni-dominated parts of the country.

But some U.S. officials were concerned that the Iraq military's apparent improved recent performance is due to a slowdown in the advance of ISIS forces and that the Sunni militants may be simply be resetting their forces for a larger assault on the capital.

One senior U.S. defense official said ISIS militants were likely to avoid a frontal onslaught on Baghdad or direct engagement with the troops stationed outside the city.

Instead, the official said militants likely would slip in through Sunni neighborhoods, then resume the kind of sectarian attacks that ripped apart Baghdad in 2006. U.S. officials are also worried about the potential of rocket and artillery attacks on Baghdad. ISIS isn't adept enough to precisely fire artillery, but will be able to hit populated areas of Baghdad...

Also at the New York Times, "Iraq’s Military Seen as Unlikely to Turn the Tide":

BAGHDAD — As Iraqi Army forces try to rally on the outskirts of Baghdad after two weeks of retreat, it has become increasingly clear to Western officials that the army will continue to suffer losses in its fight with Sunni militants and will not soon retake the ground it has ceded.

Recent assessments by Western officials and military experts indicate that about a quarter of Iraq’s military forces are “combat ineffective,” its air force is minuscule, morale among troops is low and its leadership suffers from widespread corruption.

As other nations consider whether to support military action in Iraq, their decision will hinge on the quality of Iraqi forces, which have proved far more ragged than expected given years of American training.

Even now, fighters with the militant Islamic State in Iraq and Syria are consolidating their gains, extending their hold on Euphrates River valley towns, securing access routes between their bases in Syria and the front lines in Iraq, and pressuring other Sunni groups to fight with them...

More.

#ISIS Leader Ibrahim Awwad al-Badri al-Samarrai Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi Looks to Gain Ground in #Iraq

At WSJ, "Top Militant Carves New Identity for Group: Leader of al Qaeda Offshoot ISIS, Emphasizing Practical Gains and Patriotism Over Ideology, Distinguishes His Mission":

As a master's-degree student at a university in Baghdad in 1997, Ibrahim Awwad al-Badri al-Samarrai was so poor he took cash handouts every month from a kindly professor, said a former classmate.

Now flush with cash, armed to the teeth and backed by an army known as the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, he is within striking distance of attacking the city where spent his humble youth.  The rise of the militant Islamist leader, who changed his name to Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi in 2010, is a rags-to-riches story that mirrors the rise of the ISIS militia he now leads.

By emphasizing practical gains over ideology and placing a premium on battlefield victories rather than lofty principals, Mr. Baghdadi's ISIS has become one of the most powerful militant Islamist groups, said experts on militant Islamism.  For the West, ISIS's strength and identity have created a new sort of enemy that has a reputation for brutality and in many ways looks and acts like the army of a state seeking to expand its territory.

ISIS is "actualizing the idea of the Islamic state. On the jihadi side of things, there's appeal in that," said Aaron Zelin, an expert on Islamist groups at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.  "You have guys just talking about it and al Qaeda and Jabhat Al Nusra saying they'll get there, whereas ISIS is just doing it," he said, referring to ISIS's rivals in Syria and throughout the world.

While ISIS shares much of the same ideology and jihadist vocabulary as al Qaeda, it differs on methodology. Whereas al Qaeda, which got its start during the resistance against the Soviet Union's occupation of Afghanistan during the 1980s, behaves as a terrorist organization advancing a global ideology, ISIS in many ways acts like the army of a sovereign nation with defined borders and a semi-legitimate system of governance...

Keep reading.

PREVIOUSLY: "Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi."

Sophisticated Tactics Key to #Isis Strength

A report at the Financial Times, via Mike Shedlock, "Divided Iraq Inevitable; Isis Targets Baghdad Green Zone; Obama's Inane Weapon's Proposal."

It's a lot of cut-and-paste, but here's the interesting part on ISIS, from FT:

“They [Isis] are going against a supposedly professional military force with a speed and ferocity that has the Iraqis taking to their heels,” says Patrick Skinner, a former counter-terrorism officer at the Central Intelligence Agency and now analyst at the Soufan Group. “The Iraqi Security Forces [ISF] are mind-crushingly inept.”

Of immediate concern is the seizure by the jihadis of a range of high-grade military equipment. A force once lightly armed with an arsenal of shoulder-held missile launchers and anti-aircraft guns mounted on pick-up trucks, Isis is now far more comprehensively kitted out, thanks to its raids on the depots of the Iraqi army’s second motorised division.

Identifying exactly what the jihadi group has in its armoury is complicated because it has been wildly embellishing its capabilities for effect on social media. But even a conservative list – corroborated by intelligence and military officials – is worrying enough. It includes unknown quantities of M114 Humvees, other armoured personnel carriers and Stinger missiles, as well as a huge cache of explosives and small arms and an unspecified number of M198 155m howitzer artillery pieces with a conventional range of 22km.

In July 2012, Isis – then still known as al-Qaeda in Iraq – began the first of two intensive insurgency campaigns that paved the way for its current fight.

“These were intelligent campaigns in design: well-resourced, prepared, executed and adapted,” says Jessica Lewis, a veteran US army intelligence officer who served in Iraq and is now research director at the Institute for the Study of War. “These are not things I might associate with a terrorist organisation. These are things I associate with an army.”

All of which raises questions about just how big Isis is. US intelligence officials posit a central fighting force of 3,000. Military and intelligence analysts put the minimum size of Isis’s larger force at 7,000 to 10,000. “They are not spreading themselves too thinly,” says Ms Lewis.

“They have matched personnel to their objectives carefully.”

As to what those objectives are, Isis’s attack pattern now seems to point squarely in one direction.

“Isis has uncommitted forces proximate to Baghdad,” says Ms Lewis. “They always meant to establish control. They always meant to break the state. They want Baghdad.” And specifically, she adds, the government-protected Green Zone...

The Threat to the West from al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP)

The tide of war is receding and we've got the terrorists on the run.

Famous last words.

See Ahmed Rashid, at the New York Review, "Waking Up to the New al-Qaeda":

The Yemen branch of al-Qaeda should be a particular concern to the West. AQAP is almost as old as the original al-Qaeda organization formed in Afghanistan and Pakistan by Osama bin Laden in the early 1980s. Bin Laden’s family was from Yemen and it was always his aim to maintain an organization in that country, where territory was fairly easy to acquire, in order to provide permanent bases from which to eventually seize power there. It never happened in bin Laden’s own lifetime, but now the Yemeni state is in chaos and the possibility that AQAP could gain control of a significant part of the country cannot be ruled out.

Moreover, in its fundamental aims, AQAP poses a more direct threat to Western targets than ISIS. From its initial rise to power in Iraq and Syria, ISIS has given top priority to the “near enemy,” what it views as the corrupt secular Arab regimes of the Middle East. Thus, while there have been some attacks in the West by supporters of ISIS, the group itself has set out to seize Arab territory, destroy borders, and establish a unitary Islamic state or Caliphate stretching from Morocco to India. By contrast, AQAP has maintained the original al-Qaeda aim of attacking the “far enemy”—Western countries and Western capitalism—in order to bring about the collapse of Arab regimes.

Despite a sustained US drone campaign and a brutal civil war in Yemen, AQAP continues to have a strong organization and is far from being annihilated. Unlike other branches of al-Qaeda, AQAP has never picked a fight with ISIS, despite rivalry between the two groups. ISIS may have ambitions in Yemen but the country is far from ISIS’s heartland in Iraq and Syria, and the group has decided for the moment to leave AQAP alone. All of this should make Western intelligence agencies particularly vigilant about further AQAP attacks in the West.

However, the phenomenal growth of ISIS in the past twelve months has distracted Western intelligence from the continued threat of al-Qaeda. ISIS battlefield successes have helped draw some 18,000 foreign jihadists from ninety 90 countries to join and fight for the movement in Syria and Iraq. The original al-Qaeda never managed to recruit such large numbers of followers, and ISIS’s success has provided inspiration and ideological clarity to many extremists in Europe and around the world. It also has overwhelmed Western intelligence agencies. In numerous reports, we have been told that the European intelligence agencies had far too many leads to follow, too many returning fighters from Syria and Iraq to keep tabs on, and not enough manpower to do all the tasks required. There is now little doubt that the first beneficiary of this de-facto switch in Western intelligence priorities was AQAP.

The attacks in France killed seventeen people—far fewer than the attacks on New York and Washington on September 11—but they seem to have had nearly as powerful an effect, terrifying governments across Europe, turning security protocols and precautions upside down, and even provoking demands by some leaders that the Schengen open-border policy be revised. Doubtless, in the weeks ahead we will see even greater social, political, and economic repercussions in France and other European countries, including a change in security practices at airports and train stations, and possibly in laws and detention rules by the courts. Worst of all, it may draw new support to right wing, anti-migrant, anti-Muslim political parties, making them more likely to win elections in several countries, including France.

In other words, the Paris attacks could dramatically change the way Western governments operate, which is exactly what the old al-Qaeda tried to do when it attacked the twin towers in New York. AQAP will continue to make this its strategic aim—to bring Western capitalism to its knees. ISIS represents an extraordinary threat of its own, but the Paris attacks have demonstrated that the greatest danger to the West is still al-Qaeda.

Be sure to RTWT.

Plus, from Reuters, "Al Qaeda claims French attack, derides Paris rally."

Terror in Sydney: ISIS Has Called for 'Lone-Wolf' Islamist Attacks Around the World

At WSJ:

The long reach of Islamist terror hit another Western city on Monday with a siege in downtown Sydney, and we should expect more like it as Islamic State (ISIS) tries to mobilize adherents across the world.

Iranian-born Man Haron Monis, a self-styled sheikh with a long criminal history, held dozens of hostages in a cafe while claiming to have bombs on the premises. Police stormed the restaurant and killed Monis after negotiations failed; two hostages died and four were injured.

News reports say Monis targeted the Lindt Chocolate Cafe days after he lost the appeal of his conviction for harassing families of Australian soldiers killed in Afghanistan. He also had more than 40 charges pending for sexually assaulting women while posing as a “spiritual healer,” and as an accessory to the murder last year of his ex-wife, who was stabbed and burned.

The cafe Monis attacked is part of Martin Place, a pedestrian mall near local government offices, the U.S. Consulate and major commercial towers. In September police arrested ISIS sympathizers said to be planning a public beheading there as a “demonstration killing.” Monis initially forced hostages to hold an Islamist black flag in the cafe window, then demanded that police provide him with a flag of ISIS, according to Australian media reports.

Monis’s apparent affection for ISIS is shared by a disturbing number of other Australians. Some 70 have had their passports confiscated recently for fear they may travel overseas to fight for ISIS. One such sympathizer stabbed two Melbourne police officers in September and was shot dead. Days before, an ISIS spokesman had called for “lone-wolf” attacks world-wide, including in Australia, and authorities in Canberra raised the country’s threat level to high from medium. This summer an estimated 150 Australians joined ISIS in the Middle East, including a former Sydney resident who posted photographs of his 7-year-old son holding a severed head.

Jihadists haven’t mounted a catastrophic attack in Australia, though not for lack of trying. In the past decade authorities Down Under have uncovered plots against military facilities, a sports arena and the electric grid. Terrorists have had more success targeting Aussies overseas, killing nearly 100 in attacks on the Indonesian resort island of Bali and Jakarta’s Marriott and Ritz-Carlton hotels. Eleven Indonesians died in a 2009 car bombing at the Australian Embassy in Jakarta.

Australia has been America’s staunchest ally in fighting terrorism, deploying troops to Afghanistan, Iraq and now Iraq again. As a liberal democracy with large immigrant communities and Indonesia’s population of 250 million on its doorstep, Australia understands the stakes of the West’s long war against Islamist extremism.

The threat from ISIS in particular needs to be understood as extending far beyond the territory it controls, because ISIS successes in the Middle East could motivate radicals everywhere...

More.

PREVIOUSLY: "Sydney Hostage Siege."

Patterson School Professor Robert Farley Blames George W. Bush for Fall of #Iraq

Readers may remember far-left commie-loving Professor Robert Farley from a few years back, "Patterson School of Diplomacy, University of Kentucky, Screens Steven Soderbergh's Che to Commemorate Fiftieth Anniversary of Bay of Pigs."

It should be no surprise then that this anti-American hack is posting tripe like this:

Let's not pretend that a few thousand American troops could reverse events in Iraq. http://t.co/kORABtXxJ0
— Robert Farley (@drfarls) June 11, 2014

(Click through at the link.)

Turns out the Idiot Farley's taking a pathetic swing at the WSJ editorial I posted this morning, "Fall of Mosul: Strategic Disaster Assisted by Obama's Withdrawal From Iraq." And he writes:

Long story short, the central takeaway of the WSJ piece is the effort to pass off the continued disaster of Iraq to Barack Obama, one of the only people in US politics who bears virtually no responsibility for the disaster in Iraq.

Actually, as Iraq crumbles to ISIS before our very eyes, it's Obama --- as our so-called commander-in-chief --- who bears more responsibility for this "disaster" than anyone else in the U.S. How could it be otherwise? It's been almost six years since Bush left office. Democrats in Congress, including Hillary Clinton, voted for the 2002 Resolution on the Use of Military Force in Iraq. A bipartisan war at the start, Democrats stabbed American troops in the back even before election 2004 (and the nomination of medal-throwing, unfit-for-command Hanoi John Kerry).

And it was President Obama who pulled U.S. forces from Iraq in 2011, treasonously failing to secure a residual agreement for a U.S. status-of-forces deployment.

The current Democrat-caused deterioration in Iraq was only a matter of time, as reported at this update, "Tikrit Falls as Islamic State in Iraq and Syria Sweeps Toward Baghdad!"

More at Pajamas Media, "Terrorists Take Tikrit. Will Baghdad Fall?", and the Guardian UK, "Iraq army capitulates to Isis militants in four cities."

ISIS partisans on Twitter have no doubt of Iraq's coming fall:

Raqqah: ✔ Ramadi: ✔ Samarra: ✔ Fallujah: ✔ Mosul: ✔ Baiji ✔ Tikrit ✔ Al-Bab ✔ Manbej ✔ Taiji ✔ Baghdad... Loading
— Ghazi (@ghazishami) June 11, 2014

I'm off to sleep. Hold your mentions and don't conquer Baghdad while I'm snoozing. Salam alaikum.
— Ghazi (@ghazishami) June 11, 2014

Raising the banner of #Khilafah (caliphate) over the entrance of the military barracks in Salah ad-Din, #Iraq: pic.twitter.com/mkApuSz8tu
— Abu Umar (@AbuUmar8246) June 11, 2014

Having killed off the enemy and then performed their prayers, they then burn down the barracks (#ISIS, #Iraqwar): pic.twitter.com/tH4UZhtGKG
— Abu Umar (@AbuUmar8246) June 11, 2014

Everyone is jubilant after hearing of the victories of our brothers in #Iraq (#ISIS, #Iraqwar, #Syriancivilwar): pic.twitter.com/Tgk4Dp79no
— Abu Umar (@AbuUmar8246) June 11, 2014

"The Province of Ninawah welcomes you" - The people of Ninawah in #Iraq welcome the Islamic State liberators (#ISIS) pic.twitter.com/hTn1714LHc
— Abu Umar (@AbuUmar8246) June 11, 2014

Inshalah #ISIS will liberate the whole Ummah and unite them under this banner #ISIS pic.twitter.com/tjwB82nLlp

— Al-Janabi #باقية (@AbuBakrAl_Janab) June 12, 2014

More, from Michael Knights, at Foreign Policy, "Iraq War III Has Now Begun":

The Obama administration is determined to honor its campaign pledge to end the wars. To that end, the White House withdrew U.S. combat troops in 2011. However there is an increasingly strong case that Iraq needs new and boosted security assistance, including air strikes and a massively boosted security cooperation initiative to rebuild the shattered army and mentor it in combat. The Middle East could see the collapse of state stability in a cross-sectarian, multiethnic country of 35 million people that borders many of the region's most important states and is the world's fastest-growing oil exporter. Any other country with the same importance and the same grievous challenges would get more U.S. support, but the withdrawal pledge has put Iraq in a special category all on its own. Washington doesn't have the luxury of treating Iraq as a special case anymore. ISIS has moved on since the days of the U.S. occupation and they have a plan. Washington should too.

Well, you would think.

Sad. President Obama threw away the the gains of the Bush-Petraeus surge, pissed on the sacrifices of America's fallen, and tossed the Iraqi people under the bus.

I suspect the folks at the Patterson School will be cheering the ISIS victory, most of all Professor Robert "Che" Farley.

Fall of Aleppo is Huge Gift to Islamic State

From Michael Weiss and Hassan Hassan, at the Daily Beast, "The Fall of Aleppo is a Huge Gift to ISIS":

Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the “Caliph Ibrahim” of the so-called Islamic State, had an excellent week last week.

The fall of Aleppo to a consortium of Iranian-built militias backed by Russian airpower and special forces constitutes not only a loud victory for Damascus but also a quieter one for ISIS, or the Islamic State, which mounted a surprise attack that retook the ancient city of Palmyra.

The contrast could not have been starker or a more clear vindication of one of ISIS’s longest-running propaganda tropes: the “infidels” and “apostates” will do nothing to save Sunni Arabs from the pillage, rape, and barrel bombs of the Russians, Alawites, and Shia. But Aleppo’s fall also buttresses one of the lesser-scrutinized claims made by ISIS’s former spokesman Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, shortly before his demise.

In May, months before he was taken out by a U.S. airstrike, Adnani issued what would turn out to be a final communiqué refuting a common Sunni criticism of ISIS, namely that the group’s takeover of Sunni towns and cities invariably brought only devastation. See Fallujah and Ramadi. For Adnani, however, such devastation was never the fault of ISIS, as rival jihadist enterprises had discovered at their peril.

“If we knew that any of the righteous predecessors surrendered a span of land to the infidels, using the claim of popular support or to save buildings from being destroyed or to prevent bloodshed, or any other alleged interest,” he said, “we would have done the same as the Qa’idah of the Fool of the so-called Ummah.” Only steadfastness, even in the face of overwhelming odds, would restore Sunni dignity.

Thanks to Bashar al-Assad, Vladimir Putin, and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei—not to say Barack Obama—Adnani now gets to play the posthumous prophet. Rather than die fighting for Aleppo, the Free Syrian Army (and its Western backers), plus rival Islamist or jihadist groups such the Syrian al Qaeda franchise Jabhat Fatah al-Sham, negotiated the terms of their surrender through a series of failed and humiliating “ceasefires” and evacuations, which are in fact forced population transfers. And Aleppo was still pulverized.

The loss will be compounded by the sectarian context. Aleppo fell to what Der Spiegel correspondent Christoph Reuter once aptly called the “first international Shia jihad in recent history,” led by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps and relying largely on a patchwork of guerrilla fighters from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Lebanon, and Iraq. This is precisely what Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian founding father of ISIS, wanted. He once described the Shia as “the insurmountable obstacle, the prowling serpent, the crafty, evil scorpion, the enemy lying in wait, and biting poison… Whoever takes the time to look carefully at the situation will realize that Shiism is the greater danger threatening us and the real challenge we must confront.” And the only way to confront this enemy in Iraq was to render Sunnis hopeless that anyone else would, by attacking the Shia so that the Shia took revenge by attacking the outnumbered Sunnis.

In Syria, the Zarqawi thesis is even more relevant, as the country is a Sunni majority one and is now subject to occupation by a minority. And as bad as the physical collapse of the symbolic citadel of Syria’s revolution is, worse still is the chauvinist triumphalism attending it, which plays directly into the Zarqawi strategy.

Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba, one of the Iraqi militias which the United Nations accused of murdering 85 civilians, including women and children, broadcast a song on an affiliated Iraqi TV channel. “Aleppo is Shia,” it ran. In his Friday sermon, delivered in Tehran, Ayatollah Mohammad Emami Kashani declared the “liberation” of the city from “infidels”—using more or less the same language of sectarian incitement that ISIS reserves for the Kashani’s coreligionists. In this case, the cleric was declaring all 150,000 Sunnis who’d been besieged for months in East Aleppo, and now driven from their homes, godless. Even he must be aware of the lasting repercussions of such imprecations.

Rhetorical provocation has also been met by the visual kind. Images circulating on social media to show Qassem Soleimani, Iran’s spymaster and head of the expeditionary Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guard Corps, treading the rubble in Aleppo in an unmistakable show of who was really responsible for the siege and recapture. (Bashar al-Assad, the nominal sovereign of “all of Syria,” is nowhere to be seen on this hollowed-out and Iranian-occupied battlefield.) Any of these photographs could easily grace the forthcoming issue of Rumiyah, ISIS’s propaganda magazine...

Keep reading.

The idea is that the Sunnis will be so heavily wiped out that they'll rise up and join arms with the most murderous thugs of Islamic State. That's why the fall of Aleppo's a gift to ISIS.

U.S. Air Power Won't Save #Iraq

From Erica Borghard and Costantino Pischedda, at the National Interest, "Why American Air Power Won't Save Iraq from ISIS":

President Obama’s [last] Thursday speech outlining America’s response to the situation in Iraq alluded to the possibility of an expanded U.S. role there, which could involve some form of aerial support to Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) fighting on the ground against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and other Sunni Arab insurgents. The coordination of air power and Iraqi allies on the ground (perhaps with a limited presence of American Special Operations Forces) would mirror U.S. interventions in Afghanistan in 2001 and Libya in 2011. The principal objective of a limited aerial intervention in Iraq would be to provide battlefield support to ISF to change the dynamics on the ground, decisively halting ISIS’s offensive and reversing its recent territorial gains. While this approach was tactically and operationally successful in Afghanistan and Libya, its long-term strategic benefits in those cases are more uncertain. There is no reason to expect that a similar intervention in the unfolding crisis in Iraq will further long-term American strategic interests—even if it achieves limited tactical successes.

At first glance, Iraq would seem to be an ideal setting for reenacting the Afghan/Libyan model. As it did in Afghanistan and Libya, airpower could have a decisive impact on the outcome of what are essentially conventional battles between Sunni insurgents and ISF. However, a closer look at those cases does not provide much ground for optimism. First, the antigovernment forces would adapt their tactics in response to American airpower and thus make it less effective. Similar to the response of Qaddafi’s forces to NATO bombing, ISIS and its allies would eschew massing their forces in the open in conventional formations (thus posing as targets for American precision bombs); their forces would instead disperse, take cover and conceal, which would significantly reduce their vulnerability from airpower, without necessarily ending their offensive. This tactical adjustment would not necessarily allow the insurgents to hold on to their newly conquered territory indefinitely. As the Libya case clearly shows, a prolonged intervention with precision airpower in conjunction with local ground forces can weaken and help overcome local opponents through attrition. With sufficient time, airstrikes would enable ISF to defend the territory it currently holds and even reclaim territory lost to ISIS forces.

A key point, though, is that U.S. intervention from the air will not bring about these results quickly. Indeed, the NATO operation in Libya took far longer and involved significantly more firepower than the allies initially anticipated. A few pinprick attacks are unlikely to alter the trajectory on the ground; and a more sustained military campaign would require firm American political will—something that may not be in the cards.

Second (and more crucial), in response to a successful counteroffensive on the part of the Iraqi government, supported by U.S. airpower, ISIS would certainly switch to the kind of guerrilla tactics in which it proved so proficient in the past (just as the Taliban did after its early defeat in 2001). In this scenario, ISIS and other insurgent groups, benefiting from the support of significant segments of Iraq’s Sunni population, could sustain a high-intensity guerrilla campaign against the Iraqi government for a long period of time. This reinvigorated insurgency may make the year preceding the insurgent “surge” (with hundreds of terrorist and hit-and-run attacks and over 1,000 deaths a month) look like a period of relative stability. Thus, an aerial intervention would not provide a lasting solution; at best, it would merely push ISIS and the broader Sunni resistance back to the position they were in just some months ago.

At its heart, the crisis in Iraq stems from an underlying political problem that military means alone cannot address. Namely, Maliki’s ethnosectarian policies—in particular, the systematic marginalization and humiliation of the Sunni minority—have provided fertile ground for the growth of several insurgent organizations (some Baathist, some Jihadist) claiming the mantle of defenders of Iraq’s beleaguered Sunnis. An American intervention would reduce Maliki’s incentive to institute the much-needed political reforms that would give the country’s Sunni community a stake in the future of the country. Put simply, this is an ethnosectarian war (with an important transnational Islamist component) whose long-term solution won’t be brought about from 15,000 feet in the air.

One might object to this noninterventionist approach, pointing to a series of negative consequences that may result. These concerns are not baseless, but either rest on implausible worst-case-scenario assumptions, or identify risks and costs that could only be avoided by taking even riskier and costlier courses of action...

More.

An interesting analysis.

But it ignores a key point that Ralph Peters made the other day: A political solution won't be enough. The way to stop the ISIS onslaught is to kill the jihadists. See, "Lt. Col. Ralph Peters: 'Air Power Alone' Won't Stop #ISIS."

Only the U.S. Can Prevent a Humanitarian and Strategic Disaster in Iraq

At the Wall Street Journal, "The Jihadist March in Iraq":

Perhaps history will mark this as the week that President Obama recognized that evil unimpeded will devour everything before it. We say perhaps because with this President you never know.

President Obama said Thursday night he authorized limited air strikes against the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) to stop the Sunni jihadists from carrying out a genocide in northern Iraq. What he didn't do, but should, is make a larger U.S. military commitment against ISIS both to avert a humanitarian catastrophe and protect American security interests.

After routing Iraq's army from Mosul and most of northern Iraq in June, ISIS has grown as a military force. It captured significant war materiel, including armored U.S. Humvees, and has attracted hardened jihadist fighters from Syria and elsewhere. In addition to the sums it looted from Mosul's banks, the group has the potential to gain access to revenue from oil fields in northern Iraq.

ISIS is also threatening the obliteration of the Christian population in northern Iraq. An assault by ISIS's forces in northern Nineveh province has emptied towns of their Christian populations. Some 40,000 Yazidis, a minority who have lived in Iraq for millennia, are now isolated with little food or water on Mount Sinjar. ISIS controls all roads out and has proven it will have no compunction to slaughter those who try to flee.

When ISIS captured Mosul, it often painted an "N" on the houses of Christians, denoting they are of Nazareth, the birthplace of Jesus. The Christians' confiscated properties have been given to Muslims. Ancient Christian churches have been razed. The self-proclaimed "Islamic State" is a barbaric, pre-modern movement whose goal is to expand its dominion with mass killings. Unresisted, it will not stop.

Despite ISIS's obvious threat to the viability of Iraq—it now also threatens Kurdistan in the north—the Obama Administration to this point has done nothing significant for more than two months to help the Iraqis fight back. Instead, it has insisted that the Iraqis in Baghdad first depose Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and form a more "inclusionary" government.

Under current circumstances, this policy defines "beside the point." It has become a pretext for not acting, as if ISIS will pause while Baghdad organizes itself in a way that meets Mr. Obama's standards. It is past time for the U.S. to intervene...

More at that top link.

Islamic State Conducting a Real 'War on Women' (VIDEO)

Following-up from earlier, "Report: Islamic State's Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi Raped U.S. Hostage Kayla Mueller Before Her Death (VIDEO)."

From Aaron Goldstein, at the American Spectator, "ISIS IS CONDUCTING A REAL WAR ON WOMEN":

I want to scream so many four-letter words, this story makes me so angry. Man. https://t.co/XCNsKZMtPW

— Donald Douglas (@AmPowerBlog) August 15, 2015

On Friday, it was revealed that ISIS leader Abu Bakr al Baghdadi had repeatedly raped American relief worker Kayla Mueller while she was in captivity.

Mueller was kidnapped in Syria two years ago and would never get out alive. ISIS claimed she had been killed as a result of Jordanian bombing of ISIS positions in Syria, but this is a most dubious claim. While ISIS was eager to claim she did not die at their hands they were not so eager to say their leader is a sexual sadist.

Baghdadi is hardly the only ISIS leader to engage in such evil. ISIS often kidnaps women, particularly the Yazidis, and forces them into sexual slavery. Earlier this month, 19 brave women who refused to have sex with ISIS leaders were executed.

I don't ever want to hear Democrats accuse Republicans of engaging in a war on women because ISIS is conducting a real war on women. A war in which women are actually raped and murdered. Our energies should be spent fighting the real enemy.

Controlling Home-Grown Western Islamic Terrorists

From Professor Michael Curtis, at American Thinker:

Theresa May, the home secretary in the British Conservative government, in a speech in the House of Commons on September 3, 2014, spoke of ISIS as a “group of murderous psychopaths.”  The videos of the two American journalist hostages about to be brutally beheaded show a level of evil that should draw the attention of the World Council of Churches, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Alice Walker, and the “scholars” of the American Studies Association, hitherto almost exclusively preoccupied with criticism of alleged violations of humanitarian rights by Israel.

The beheading of the second journalist, Steven Sotloff, is even more poignant than that of James Foley based on the knowledge that he was the grandson of Holocaust survivors, and the son of a mother who taught at a Jewish school in Miami.  U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry is not alone in regarding this cruelty of ISIS as “an act of medieval savagery by a coward hiding behind a mask.”  We are now aware that ISIS has committed other such acts, especially the execution by firing squads in desert areas of Iraq of more than 500, and possibly as many as 770, people.

Almost everyone, except perhaps for those named above, now appreciates that ISIS is not simply a “manageable problem,” as President Barack Obama described it, but is a group that must be crushed.  It is not sufficient to condemn the violent Islamist preaching with which the West has become familiar.  It is essential to end the brutality and the menace of ISIS by every means in the Western armory.  The wheels of judgment should not grind exceeding slow....

At the NATO meeting on September 4, 2014 at Celtic Manor near Cardiff, Wales, President Obama and British Prime Minister David Cameron urged their fellow members of NATO to confront the “brutal and poisonous” Islamic state.  A possible NATO coalition may be created to implement this response through a variety of measures: military power, diplomatic activity, and economic constraints.  However, it is disappointing that no specific pledges of action have been agreed upon.

It was more encouraging that NATO members understood that the more urgent and important issue facing the alliance is not the threat of Russia, however objectionable the policy of Putin towards Ukraine, but the Islamic threat from ISIS and other terrorist groups not only in Iraq and Syria, but also in their own countries.

It should be an international priority to end the caliphate announced by ISIS as soon as possible before it spreads its control over areas in the Middle East.  But equally urgent is the need for policies to deal with the threat of Europeans and Americans – namely, home-grown terrorists, who have fought for ISIS and may return to their countries of origin and undertake terrorist activities.

This issue is not easy to resolve, because what animates Western jihadists remains a mystery.  What makes Muslim citizens of Europe and the United States leave to join the ISIS group and be prepared to commit murderous attacks in their countries of origin when they return?  Are they psychopaths, or are they motivated to act through conviction on political and social issues?

Psychologists tend to suggest that there is no conclusive evidence to determine if terrorists or others who take pleasure in violence are insane, disturbed, or abnormal.  Regarding non-Islamic issues, one can identify the lunacy of the multi-murderer Ted Bundy, an apparently charming man, who confessed, “I just like to kill.  I wanted to kill.”  Likewise with the murderous Baader-Meinhof group (Red Army Faction), the far-left militant group in West Germany from 1970 1998 responsible for bank robberies and the deaths of at least 34 people.  They may have genuinely believed they were engaged in an anti-imperialist struggle and were acting on behalf of the counter-culture.

More.

Islamic State Is Modern Islam

From Daniel Greenfield, at FrontPage Magazine, "There Is No Modern Islam":

Like math and the Midwest, ISIS confuses progressives. It’s not hard to confuse a group of people who never figured out that if you borrow 18 trillion dollars, you’re going to have to pay it back. But ISIS is especially confusing to a demographic whose entire ideology is being on the right side of history.

Raised to believe that history inevitably trended toward diversity in catalog models, fusion restaurants and gay marriage, the Arab Spring led them on by promising that the Middle East would be just like Europe and then ISIS tore up their Lonely Planet guidebook to Syria and chopped off their heads.

But ISIS also believes that it’s on the right side of history. Its history is the Koran. The right side of its history is what Iraq and Syria look like today. It’s also how parts of Europe are starting to look.

Progressive politicians and pundits trying to cope with ISIS lapse into a shrill incoherence that has nothing to do with their outrage at its atrocities and a lot to do with their sheer incomprehension. Terms like “apocalyptic nihilism” get thrown around as if heavy metal were beginning to make a comeback.

Those few analysts who admit that the Islamic State might be a just a little Islamic emphasize that it’s a medieval throwback, as if there were some modern version of Islam to compare it to.

Journalists trying to make sense of ISIS demanding Jizya payments and taking slaves ought to remember that these aren’t medieval behaviors in the Middle East. Not unless medieval means the 19th century. And that’s spotting them a whole century. Saudi Arabia only abolished slavery in 1962 under pressure from the United States. Its labor market and that of fellow Petrojihadi kingdoms like Kuwait and Qatar are based on arrangements that look a lot like temporary slavery… for those foreigners who survive.

Non-Muslims paid Jizya to Muslim rulers until very recently. Here is what it looked like in nineteenth century Morocco from the account of James Riley, an American shipwrecked sea captain.

“The Mohammedan scrivener appointed to receive it took it from them, hitting each one a smart blow with his fist on his bare forehead, by way of receipt for his money, at which the Jews said, ‘Thank you, my lord.’”

Those Jews who could not pay were flogged and imprisoned until they converted to Islam. An account from 1894 is similar, except that the blows were delivered to the back of the neck. Only French colonialism finally put a stop to this practice as well as many other brutal Islamic Supremacist laws.

Morocco was one of the Arab countries where Jews were treated reasonably well by the standards of the Muslim world. It’s one of the few Arab countries to still retain a Jewish population. When ISIS demands Jizya from non-Muslims, it’s not reviving some controversial medieval behavior. It’s doing what even “moderate” Muslim countries were doing until European guns and warships made them stop.

If the French hadn’t intervened, the same ugly scene would have gone on playing out in Morocco. If the United States hadn’t intervened, the Saudis would still openly keep slaves.

Islam never became enlightened. It never stopped being ‘medieval’. Whatever enlightenment it received was imposed on it by European colonialism. It’s a second-hand enlightenment that never went under the skin.

ISIS isn’t just seventh century Islam. It’s also much more recent than that. It’s Islam before the French and the English came. It’s what the Muslim world was like before it was forced to have presidents and constitutions, before it was forced to at least pay lip service to the alien notion of equal rights for all.

The media reported the burning of the Jordanian pilot as if it were some horrifying and unprecedented aberration. But Muslim heretics, as well as Jews and Christians accused of blasphemy, were burned alive for their crimes against Islam. Numerous accounts of this remain, not from the seventh century, but from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Those who weren’t burned, might be beheaded.

These were not the practices of some apocalyptic death cult. They were the Islamic law in the “cosmopolitan” parts of North Africa. The only reason they aren’t the law now is that the French left behind some of their own laws.

Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia that were never truly colonized still behead men and women for “witchcraft and sorcery.” Not in the seventh century or even in the nineteenth century. Last year.

The problem isn’t that ISIS is ‘medieval’. The problem is that Islam is...

More.

U.S. May Launch Airstrikes Ahead of Forming New Government in #Iraq

Following-up from my last entry, "Nouri al-Maliki Commits to Formation of New Government in #Iraq."

Now here's Michael Gordon, at the New York Times, "Kerry Says ISIS Threat Could Hasten Military Action":

BAGHDAD — Winding up a day of crisis talks with Iraqi leaders, Secretary of State John Kerry said on Monday that the Sunni militants seizing territory in Iraq had become such a threat that the United States might not wait for Iraqi politicians to form a new government before taking military action.

“They do pose a threat,” Mr. Kerry said, referring to the fighters from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. “They cannot be given safe haven anywhere.”

“That’s why, again, I reiterate the president will not be hampered if he deems it necessary if the formation is not complete,” he added, referring to the Iraqi efforts to establish a new multisectarian government that bridges the deep divisions among the majority Shiites and minority Sunnis, Kurds and other smaller groups....

While the political consultations continue behind closed doors, ISIS has become a growing regional danger. Its fighters have basically erased Iraq’s western border with Syria, which is expected to strengthen their position there. They have also taken the town of Rutba in western Iraq, which sits astride the road to Jordan and could head south from there to Saudi Arabia....

So great are the concerns that Mr. Kerry stressed on Monday that if American action is taken soon — President Obama has said that he is considering airstrikes — it should not be interpreted as a gesture of political support for Mr. Maliki’s Shiite-dominated government, but rather as a strike against the ISIS militants. Such a decision by Mr. Obama, Mr. Kerry said, should not be considered to be an act of “support for the existing prime minister or for one sect or another.”

I think there's more to it than that. Maliki is on edge, knowing that not just his government's on the line, but his life. No doubt he demanded prompt U.S. military action against ISIS, especially since Obama's precipitous withdrawal of U.S. forces has created the worst nightmare scenario on the ground.

More at Telegraph UK, "Iraq crisis: John Kerry vows 'intense, sustained' US support in fight against Isis," and at the BBC, "Iraq crisis: Kerry vows 'intense support' to counter Isis."

And here's this tidbit from the Guardian UK:

A close ally of Maliki has described him as having grown bitter towards the US in recent days over its failure to provide strong military support.

Barack Obama agreed last week to send up to 300 US special forces troops as advisers, but has held back from air strikes requested by the Iraqi government. The gains made by Isis – backed by disaffected Sunni tribes and former Baathists – has forced the US to look to Iran as a potential ally.

Obviously, the U.S. doesn't want to give ISIS advance warning of pending U.S. military action, but strong victories on the battlefield should be a prerequisite for the formation of a new government. Note too that despite the administration's eagerness for a rapprochement with Tehran, for decades U.S. policy had been to bolster a strong Iraq against the revolutionary Shia Islamist regime in Iran.

Expect updates throughout the day.

Military Package for U.S. Counteroffensive Against #ISIS in Iraq

Following-up from earlier, "Iraq Expert Danielle Pletka Beats Back Leftist Talking Points on 'Crossfire'."

See Jack Keane and Danielle Pletka, at the Wall Street Journal, "A Plan to Save Iraq From ISIS and Iran":

The Middle East is in a downward spiral. More than 160,000 have died in Syria's civil war, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, aka ISIS, has captured key Iraqi cities and is marching on Baghdad, and the security investments made by the U.S. over the past decade—like them or not—are being frittered away.

It is still possible to reverse the recent gains of ISIS, an outgrowth of what was once al Qaeda in Iraq. The group's fighters number only in the thousands, and while well-armed, they lack the accoutrements of a serious military. But only the United States can provide the necessary military assistance for Baghdad to beat back our shared enemy.

Setting aside for the moment the question of whether this administration has the will to intervene again in Iraq, here are the components of a reasonable military package that can make a difference:

• Intelligence architecture. Iraq's intel screens went blank after the U.S. military pulled out in 2011. Washington needs to restore Baghdad's ability to access national, regional and local intelligence sources, enabling the Iraqi military to gain vital situational awareness.

• Planners and advisers. The Iraqi military needs planners to assist with the defense of Baghdad and the eventual counter-offensive to regain lost territory, as well as advisers down to division level where units are still viable.

• Counterterrorism. Special operations forces should be employed clandestinely to attack high value ISIS targets and leaders in Iraq and Syria.

• Air power. Air power alone cannot win a war, but it can significantly diminish enemy forces and, when used in coordination with ground forces, can exponentially increase the odds of success.

SIS has made extraordinary progress in recent weeks in Iraq and controls large swaths of territory in northern Syria. But its forces are not impregnable and their tactics are not terribly complicated. ISIS has progressed via two main routes in Iraq, traveling during the day in columns. Its forces and staging areas are exposed targets—but the Iraqis have very limited air power.

Intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and some of the necessary target development have already begun on the Iraq side; the U.S. needs to expand them to the Syria side of the Iraqi-Syrian border. We need to know more about who is moving, how they're moving, who is helping, and how to stop them. This target information will assist air interdiction and non-American ground forces to counter ISIS.

The next necessary step is air interdiction of ISIS staging areas, supplies, sanctuaries and lines of communication...

Continue reading.

See also, "Frederick Kagan and William Kristol: Plan for #Iraq."

#Iraq Military May Not Be Capable of Counteroffensive

From Jessica Lewis, at the Wall Street Journal, "The Terrorist Army Marching on Baghdad":

The extremists are encircling Baghdad and likely planning an offensive. But ISIS may move again to strike Samarra, 70 miles to the north and close to the ISIS front line. If these Islamists, who are Sunnis, seize Samarra's al-Askari mosque—a revered Shiite monument—the country will be thrown into another sectarian civil war. That has long been ISIS's aim. In a civil war, ISIS thinks it can emerge as the stronger military power. Then the group would have a state, would be fully armed and ready to expand westward, into Syria's northern cities beyond ISIS-held Raqqa.

The Shiite-dominated Iraqi troops would likely fight to protect Samarra and Baghdad. But the Iraqi military is not at full strength, and its forces are not combat-ready. Desertion, low morale and maintenance deficiencies are rampant. Over the past year, ISIS has thoroughly intimidated Iraqi troops in the north. Three of the four northern army divisions are defunct. The remainder are gathering now in Samarra and Taji, regrouping under other formations for the protection of Samarra and Baghdad.

Another problem: Many of Iraq's deployable units are already reinforcing Anbar province in the west against ISIS. According to 2013 estimates, the Iraqi army contains 14 maneuver divisions, roughly 200,000 soldiers in addition to 40,000 federal police and 300,000 local police. Four of the army's divisions are assigned to northern areas of Iraq that have just fallen out of state control. If Iraqi security forces try to retake the north, ISIS would be joined by Baathist elements loyal to the memory of Saddam Hussein and additional insurgent groups in trying to repel them. The Iraqi military simply may not have the capacity to launch a sufficient counteroffensive...

Continue reading.

Recall I posted Jessica Lewis yesterday, "#Iraq Analysis — The Battle for Baghdad: Scenarios."

Voters Want Ground Troops in Obama's War on Islamic State

From Andrew Malcolm, at IBD, "Voters' verdict: Obama's ISIS action plan is not good enough":

On Wednesday, President Obama sent a draft authorization for use of military power against ISIS. But already Americans say such a half-hearted assault on terrorists is not good enough.

As a political symbol (and to spread the blame when something goes wrong), Obama has asked Congress for authority to do what he's already been doing since September -- bomb ISIS as part of an international coalition and train and arm Kurds, Iraqis and Syrians.

This is authority the Nobel Peace Prize winner did not seek before attacking Libya in 2011, a successful war that also succeeded in turning that country into a lawless land of terrorist groups and marauding militias that killed four Americans in Benghazi.

But in a brief Wednesday afternoon statement on his authorization request (Scroll down for full C-SPAN video of that statement), Obama ended up saying as much about what he does not want to do.

"The resolution we’ve submitted today does not call for the deployment of U.S. ground combat forces to Iraq or Syria," Obama maintained. "It is not the authorization of another ground war, like Afghanistan or Iraq."

However, a new Rasmussen Reports poll also out Wednesday reveals for the first time that a majority of Americans are now sufficiently concerned about ISIS' barbarism and terrorist threat that it supports the use of ground combat troops again in Iraq as part of an international effort.

The poll of 800 likely voters found that 52% want to do more than Obama, 28% do not and 20% don't know.

The numbers show steady growth in support of ground troop deployment since September when 48% liked that idea and 36% were opposed. A key element in that support is involvement of other countries, especially Muslim ones.

A December Rasmussen survey found fully 79% agreeing with military experts (and disagreeing with Obama) that air assaults alone would be insufficient to defeat ISIS and U.S. ground troops would be necessary at some point.

Voters disagree by party, but not as sharply as you might expect--with 67% of Republicans favoring a ground troop commitment while a near majority of Democrats (45%) agree.

Coming just weeks after Obama boasted of withdrawing all American combat troops from Afghanistan and just four years after pulling all U.S. forces from Iraq, the Democrat is loathe to commit them again. Remember last summer when he openly confessed he had no ISIS strategy?

But some 2,500 are already back in Iraq. Obama stressed their mission is training. But they're armed and combat would seem inevitable. Canadian snipers recently engaged and dispatched an ISIS mortar crew firing on coalition forces...

Obama's the endless nightmare in the Oval Office. Americans are just counting down until they can be rid of this national embarassment.

Keep reading.

And see U.S. News, "Public Doubts Obama's ISIS Strategy."