The push to take back Ramadi has recently highlighted a litany of convoluted policy and societal sectarian concerns that have created pathways for DAESH to increase their territory and hold new positions.
Additionally, there’s little direction and confidence in US policy regarding Iraq as the Iraq Interior Ministry has heavily relied on Iranian Quds Forces. This alliance, and the Shia-dominated government, has alienated many Sunni Iraqis, who see offensives against DAESH as fulfilling Shiite sectarian governmental goals and affirming long-term control from Iran. Even with these difficult circumstances, DAESH is finally showing signs of exhaustion.
Iraqi political integration has been painfully elusive and mostly illusory. The Shiite-dominated government has been accused of pursuing its own interests in the war against DAESH, such as not defending Sunni-majority cities and failing to mount attacks to retake fallen ones. Four months ago Ramadi fell to brutal and swift DAESH forces, creating a need for the Iraqi government to organize and show that it was not defenseless against DAESH advances. However, squabbling within the government and a complete lack of trust in those tasked with such missions left Ramadi in DAESH hands. Conspiracy theories abound as to whether this is some master Shiite strategy engineered from Tehran.
In addition to a non-unified government, Iraq’s military operations are organized as a patchwork of Sunni and Shiite militias, national security forces, and Iranian-backed Shiite paramilitaries. The Iraqi Interior Ministry is said to be under the command of Qassem Suleimani, the regionally venerated Iranian Quds Force Commander. This has not only further isolated Sunni militias in Iraq, but has created divisions within the Iraqi command hierarchy, as the Prime Minister is seen as losing control of his own military to Iranian influence. Notably, the most effective force acting against DAESH has been Iraqi and Syrian Kurds, which muddies the territorial integrity waters further as their successes push advocates who ultimately see an independent Kurdistan as a globally-recognized state.
While Iraqi authority struggles with sectarian divides within their government and military, US policy has largely focused on containing DAESH. Containment was thought to be a losing strategy at the beginning of the offensive, but the extremists’ fight has largely stood still in the past year compared to its initial campaigns. Since the Clinton administration, counterterrorism units have largely believed that the global terror threat cannot be solved in any definite way, but only ‘managed.’ Terrorism is largely seen as permanent fixture in a modern world of advanced globalism and high technology. DAESH has not only condensed terrorism into one large territory of contested dominion, but has escalated brutality beyond what the world had previously witnessed. This has not only discredited all political and religious motivation behind its movement, but has allowed the worst of terrorism to permeate into the local culture and conscience. Unfortunately this has, for some, only affirmed the idea that containment is the only real possibility, not obliteration. The internal disharmony within Iraq, fueled by the various sectarian groups and a reinvigorated strategic Iran, certainly does not create hope for an internal Iraqi solution to the DAESH problem.
A microcosm of US and international policy against DAESH has been the long struggle for Kobane, Syria. Strategically important, the US used Kobane as the Ottomans used the Dardanelles against the British in the First World War, letting the enemy pierce themselves again and again in a strategic dead end. It is estimated that over 2,000 DAESH members, mostly foreigners, have died at Kobane. Coalition partners used air strikes again and again for a large part of a year to stop all DAESH advances in Kobane. This strategy, however, must contend with DAESH stories of indiscriminate killing, rape, huge desertion numbers, murders of doctors and scientists, and brutality toward homosexuals and non-DAESH religion. As a result, 2015 has seen a large decrease in recruitment numbers into Syria and Iraq. Additionally, as Syrian Kurds secure Jarabulus, said to be the last undefended city for allowing DAESH recruits passage deeper into the area, those numbers are projected to fall even further. Thus, while DAESH was the largest modern terrorist movement to gain control of large swaths of state territory, it was always going to be faced with dead ends in transforming that small rule into an offensive that could challenge the formal rule of large powers long-term. By allowing them to operate in a constrained territory, perhaps accidentally or unintentionally, US and international policy has effectively allowed DAESH terrorism to somewhat exhaust itself into a strategic dead end.
Since DAESH will not be ‘defeated’ in the near future, it allows them some freedom to operate and create a black hole of terrorism inside of a de facto Iraqi civil governance war. As with most terrorist movements, DAESH was born in a power vacuum. Much like the Taliban, DAESH gained prominence at a time when the government was either discredited or transitional, leaving little home power to stop such movements. Without a strong legitimate home rule to use effective power to control civil unrest, the ethnic diversity among Sunni, Shias, and Kurds has led to a mismanaged government and weak security state. Even if DAESH was to be defeated in the near term, these complications will not go away any time soon. With Syria becoming further destabilized, Iraq will continue to have a strong element of disruption along its Western border. With the new nuclear accord and lifting of sanctions, Iran will have sustained influence inside the Iraqi government, further alienating Sunni Iraqis and perhaps allowing a violent DAESH legacy to remain to facilitate its own objectives.
While DAESH continues its brutality and human rights abuses, the inability of the Iraqi government to function adequately in the wake of its advances creates a dire security problem in the Middle East. These problems will certainly not disappear with the elimination of DAESH, as that might not be truly possible, but only highlight the debilitating sectarian divides within Iraq and Syria. A unified government will need to include a strong Sunni presence and formal Kurd involvement for any future stability to be present within Iraq. However, with Sunnis generally frustrated with their minority involvement in the democratic process and Kurds pushing for autonomy, all apparently approved of and designed by strings being pulled from Iran, the instability may continue unabated with or without DAESH presence. As has occurred in Syria, a black hole of civil governance unrest in Iraq with multiple proxy players may spell doom for long-term peace and stability. While US policy has largely discredited DAESH, there’s little recognition of the underlying societal problems in the area. As long as the US and others do not address the effects of political disunity and sectarian divides, then DAESH in the long-term might be the region’s smallest problem.