President Barack Obama

The Sunni jihadist group ISIS has cleverly manipulated the US Government’s actions using social media channels. The terrorists calculated that uploading videos of the beheadings of two US journalists and a British aid worker onto the internet would provoke a disproportionate military response from the West. Right on cue, President Barack Obama reacted by vowing to fight ISIS “by any means necessary”. Vice President Joe Biden went further, declaring the intent to chase the group to the “gates of hell”. What followed played out according to a well-worn script. The US intensified its aerial bombardments against ISIS in an area the size of Great Britain. And, naturally, the UK signed up as the major US ally on the bombing missions. 

Professor Stephen Zunes, an expert on Middle East politics and a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize for his work with the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), said the bombings played into the hands of the terrorists.

“Aerial bombardments could only be justified strategically and morally if there were armoured columns of ISIS fighters heading down a highway towards a town, but when you bomb buildings in urban areas you’ve got to weigh the limited strategic advantages the inevitable killing of innocent civilians. This plays into the terrorists’ hands by allowing ISIS to depict themselves as defenders of Islam against Western imperialism. The result is more recruitment to the jihadist cause.

In the same speech, Obama also spoke out against handing out unconditional aid to corrupt and autocratic regimes.

 “He said it stirred up extremism, but since he became President, Obama has spent US$25 billion propping up the Nouri al-Maliki regime, which is the very definition of ‘corrupt and autocratic’,” said Professor Zunes. He added: “One might have expected more of Obama, but he has continually compromised his ideals as president - including on the Palestinian question. He has been more pragmatic than ideological and a number of his policies have definitely had me scratching my head.”

Obama’s support for al-Maliki was a continuation of the misguided policies of President George Bush. Shortly after the 2003 invasion, the US occupying force took the disastrous decision to effectively dismantle the two major bastions of secular nationalism in Iraq - the armed forces and the civil service. They were replaced by partisans of sectarian Shiite parties and factions, some of which were closely allied to Iran. 

The consequences of the US policy were far-reaching. Iraq’s growing sectarian divide led to conflict between rival groups. Sunni extremists, believing Iraqi Shias had betrayed their country to Persians and Westerners, began targeting Shia civilian neighbourhoods with terrorist attacks. The Iraqi regime and allied militia then began kidnapping and murdering thousands of Sunni men.  

Some of the more enlightened Sunni tribesmen and leaders, however, began to see al-Qaeda extremists as a bigger threat than the Shiite Government and the US invaders. In return for promises of a larger Sunni presence in both the Government and the armed forces, they agreed to switch sides.

“That led to a lull in the fighting which Republicans and various pundits falsely attributed to the US troop surge that followed,” said Professor Zunes. “But the real reason was the decision of the Sunni leaders to change sides and this is the great lesson of the Iraq conflict. We are already seeing that Sunnis in areas controlled by ISIS are unhappy with their extremism. ISIS regards anyone who does not blindly accept its dictates as an infidel, including local Sunnis.”  

One of the keys to solving the ISIS problem is, therefore, to mobilize the more moderate Sunni forces against the extremists.