Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) - Essay Example

 Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) Abstract There are various terrorist organizations around the world. The organization acts as a threat to local and international security. Some of these organizations are seen as a threat to United States. One of such organization is the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). ISIS is a terrorist organization of Sunni sect that seeks to cause unrest in Iraq by establishing a transnational state based on the Sharia law. The group emerged after invasion of Iraq by United States in pursuit of Saddam Hussein. Formerly, the group was called Al-Qaeda in Iraq and immediately after the invasion; the group started an insurgency against the coalition forces and their domestic’s allies. The group activities declined in 2006 and 2007 after various measures to counter terrorism. However, after the withdrawal of the US forces in 2011 the group has since increased its attacks targeting the Shiites in an attempt to reignite conflict in Iraq between the Shiite dominated government and the minority Sunnis. According to the report of United Nations, in 2013 alone, there was bloodshed on thousands of the population. In 2012, ISIS was adopted as the formal name of the group and replaced AQI. This is an expression of its broadest ambition because its fighters are challenging the Assad regime in the neighboring Syria. In June 2014, attacked military installations Mosul and took control of the entire city. Introduction ISIS or the Islamic state is an extremist movement that makes even Al-Qaeda squeamish. It attracts militants who are eager to build the new caliphate from all over the world. The ISIS army is a mixture of extremists from different parts of the universe including Chechen snipers, Saudi Arabia’s car bombers and western misfits like Douglas McAuthur McCain who has signed to fight among them. The group has kidnapped and murdered American journalists, butchered over seven hundred Sheitats in Syria, and threaten the existence of the Iraq’s Yazidi community. They employ the vicious Hudud punishments in enforcing sharia laws in the areas they control in Iraq and Syria. The Jihadist group is also known as the “Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant” (ISIL) and controls an unrecognized sate and caliphate in the Middle East. The Origin ISIS originated from the almost fallen Al-Qaeda. The Al-Qaeda who embarked on arbitrary and brutal treatment of civilians tried to ignite a sectarian war to the majority Shia community in 2006 under Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. The ignition was almost a success after they bombed a Shia shrine, Al-Askariya Mosque, in Samarra sparking retaliatory attacks. Their leader was however killed and the group was nearly destroyed (Charles River Editors, 2014, 10). When the US forces left Iraq, a ‘third generation’ of Al Qaeda emerged. Rebranding their name to Islamic State in Iraq, 2006 saw the birth of this new generation of Al Qaeda. They would later add and Syria to the name to complete the name ISIS. The Shia-dominated government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, they claimed, starved resources and excluded the Sunnis from a share of power. The new leader, Abu Omar al Baghdadi re-established the group’s influence through ideologies when Sunni senior political leaders were being arrested and people from the Sunni dissent suffered heavy-handed suppression (Charles River Editors, 2014, 16). In 2010, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi was killed in a joint US-Iraq operation paving way for the Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi governance. In 2013, ISI absorbed the Al-Nusra Front which was an Al Qaeda backed militant group in Syria. Al-Baghdadi named the group ISIS. Al-Nusra Front’s leader and Al Qaeda however later renounced the ties after months of infighting. The group then started taking control of cities starting with Mosul and Tikrit freeing prisoners and radicalizing young people. Discussion The founder of the group is known as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, Jordanian with an Arab descent that increased the sectarian tensions after the US overthrew Saddam Hussein in 2003. Zarqawi was a former commander in heart of Afghanistan fleeing into Iraq in 2001. Zarqawi joined the Ansar-al-Islam a Kurdish separatist movement in which he led the Arab contingent. Before the 2003 US invasion in Iraq, US security officials presented a case to the United Nations Security Council that linked Osama Bin Laden with Zarqawi. In the same month, the US state department linked the AQI as a terrorist organization. Zarqawi activities were relevant to those of Al-Qaeda despite Al-Qaeda’s destruction in Afghanistan. According to a report released in 2011 by the Strategic and International Studies, Zarqawi had developed strategy to defeat the coalition forces by isolating the US forces, targeting its allies, targeting the construction efforts, aid workers, and finally draw the US military a Shiite-Sunni civil war by mainly targeting the Shiites. The leadership of the group changed after the 2006 airstrike that killed Zarqawi and Abu Ayyub al-Masri who was a former aide of Zawahiri took over leadership of the group. In 2006, Masri changed the name of the group into ISI to gain support from the locals. Later on, it came to be known as ISIS that reflected its broadened ambitions as the 2011 uprising in Syria created new opportunities to exploit. Currently, Abu Bakr-alBaghdadi also called Abu Du’a, leads the group, and the government of the United States believes that he resides in Syria. ISIS leadership keeps changing on a daily basis that given them a military advantage against the Iraq forces. Additionally, it has an active military command that enable it to function as a conventional military. Moreover, the group is adaptive to the daily developments; it has the highest decision-making body that gives orders to commanders on the group to act. The ISIS’s ideology it aims to establish a caliphate. This new system of government came into being after the death of Muhammad under Abu Barks. Its last manifestation was capitalized in the Ottoman Empire- that controlled the Muslim world. The ideology of the group is to spread Islam to all corners of the world. The ideology depicts that there has been a decline of the Muslim world and there has been success of the west since the nineteenth century because there has been a Muslim deviation from Islam by not applying Islamic law to governance in totality. . The main objective of ISIS is to set up a state of Islamic in Syria and Iraq. The organization would like to take over the northern provincials of Iraq so as to bring into the Islamic state. For ISIS to take over these towns, it has to kick ISF out. It has accomplished the named offensive ISIS harvest operation was aiming to offer the firm power of terrain, especially in Ninewa, to rule Mosul as a reward within the province and to divide the ISF beginning from Mosul. Consequently, the group gets funding from various supporters from in Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. Additionally, Iran also financed the AQI; Tehran saw it as an opportunity to challenge the US forces in the region and 2006, and the US treasury confiscated Iranian Revolutionary Guards presence in northern Iraq. However, much of the finances of ISIS according to the experts come from extortion, smuggling and other crimes. Currently, ISIS gets much of its funds from the internal recruits and the manpower from its loyalist forces. Prior to the takeover of Mosul, which is Iraq’s second largest city in June 2014, ISIS collected taxes from businesses, and they could collect up to $8 million a month. On Military capabilities, ISIS has about 10,000-armed fighters in both Iraq and Syria. About 2000 of these fighters are foreigners from about 60 countries across the world. About 1000 participants on this group are of European decent. Additionally, ISIS is also composed local and foreign unlawful networks. There are also about 10,000 local Iraqis majority from the Sunni sect working for the ISIS. They are mainly involved in logistics, personnel training, governance, and indoctrination of the local unarmed militias. As a result, ISIS is an umbrella group comprising of about 25,000 people with different interest and expectations. About 15, 000 are heavily armed and can be divided into six battalions. In these battalions, they have tanks, personnel carriers, and howitzer, artillery and rocket launchers. Currently, ISIS does not have air force capability so it cannot fly. Majority of the weapons are believed to have come from Libya. Such weapons include anti-tank missiles, and antiaircraft missiles were smuggled from Libya into Syria through Turkey. ISIS intends to attack the United States using the fighters it has with passports of the United States and Western Europe. Their main aim according to the Obama administration is to kill and abandon. This is evident from the recent execution of an American Journalist James Forey. The amount of text on this page is unacceptable – the amount of space in your footnotes makes your writing very difficult to follow the threat involves the Americans who have trained with the group and might turn back to the United States using those passports to conduct terrorist activities. ISIS most relies on the social media Platforms like Twitter and YouTube to spread its propaganda to the outside world. According to the Iraq intelligence released by the Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, shows that ISIS was planning tube attacks in the United States and France on the major subway transportation systems. However, the United States had not identified any specific threat and welcomed the government of Baghdad to give any information of the attacks. Additionally, the intelligence did not give any specific dates on the planned attack but the Iraq prime minister insisted that the evidence he had was credible. The Ideology The group is both politically charged and still rules through Islam fanaticism. The group plans of starting an Islamic state where Sharia laws will be followed to book. They insist of separate schools for girls and boys or basically separating them during schooling. Women must also wear a full veil or niqab in public. Music will also be banned and the fast will be lawfully enforced during Ramadan. The Sharia laws will cover both religious and non-religious aspects of the citizen’s lives. Their propaganda is so attractive because it promises to deliver a Pure Mohammadan Islam state once the caliphate has defeated the infidel enemies. That is how they are able to recruit new well-educated Muslims from Europe and America adding another promise of a first truly Islamic university in history. Though they have wrapped up their narrative in the familiar language of the other extremists groups, jihad and fighting for the grounds of Allah, ISIS ideology amounts to destroying anyone or anything that disagrees with them. It is just a reincarnated Al Qaeda with a different name and a different way of approaching the taking over of the Middle East. Its ideology, which seeks to overturn the status quo and expand constantly, seems susceptible of living beyond the elimination of the primary advocates. ISIS seems to be following the ideologies of Wahhabism and Qutbism but in the violence of all forms with evil subordinating the good. They believe that the Muslims have been corrupted and seduced by the West deviating them from true Islam and therefore need liberation. Collection Programs One of the best collection programs that could be utilized in the ISIS area is HUMINT. This is the use of human intelligence to gather intelligence by means of interpersonal contact. This method, though dangerous, is the only effective method that could be used to obtain intelligence about the internal ISIS operations that cannot otherwise be gathered. The group is sworn to a secretive life and only joining them could allow an individual to get the critical information about their operations. ISIS, unlike other extremist movement does not see itself as an organization whose goal is only to get a geographically ill-defined Islamic community but sees itself as modern nation state. ISIS has periodically issued threats to the United States and the West but it is mainly concentrating on acquisition of ground in the Middle East. Having their eyes mainly on Syria and Iraq, the group has hidden secrets about their operations of forming the so called Islamic state. No extremist group has ever referred to themselves as a state and this new ideology shows that ISIS has so much they plan to gain and acquire and thus the need for HUMINT within the arms of their leadership. HUMINT could get in to the ISIS acting as the many recruits who are being appealed to join the movement. They have been appealing to Muslims around the world who sees the West as having neo-colonialism ambitions in the Muslim world to join them asserting that their main goal is to eliminate the artificial boundaries separating the Muslims and the middle East and throughout the world. The other collection program that could be utilized is the SIGINT. This is the intelligence gathered by interception of signals in the communication of the enemies and from electronic signals from devices that are not actually used in communication. In the case of ISIS, Predator Drones could be effective though the movement’s conspiracy and victimization has been so perfect in mobilizing and creating solidarity within the members that it has attracted great scholars and professionals who may detect the drones very easily. GEOINT or else Geospatial Intelligence will give an overall of communication capabilities within the ISIS state. OSINT or open source intelligence is always the best type of intelligence gathering since it brings about 50% of the intelligence. It is finding, selecting and acquiring information from the available public sources. It should always be employed. Intelligent Community Key Players The members of the Intelligence Community that would be the best collectors of intelligence on ISIS should include the Department of Defense. The Department of Defense main objective would be the special operation that requires military force and skills. These include protecting the people from violence, protecting key facilities, controlling mass movements of people, and also providing essential supplies and services to the people affected by the War. They should also augment the capabilities of Civil Organizations. Their activities and operations should be executed by geographic combatant’s commanders, subordinate theater special operations command commanders and other joint force commanders. They should work together with other interagency elements and the indigenous and surrogate forces whom they share mutual threats. The FBI should also be included in the collection of intelligence sine the ISIS has infiltrated into the US and all the other countries. The threat of this infiltration increases as days go by since the ISIS is still recruiting members from all around the globe. They should be fully involved in the CONUS operations. The CIA which is mainly in charge of the overseas operations should also be involved in the collection of intelligence. They should also provide the HUMINT intelligence and find ways of getting into the ISIS operations. Intelligence Analysis Strategies The most effective analysis strategy is the Red Team Analysis. The analysts’ role should be to put themselves in ISIS members’ shoes and get to know the operations of the extremists group. This is because most of the ISIS operations intelligence would not be otherwise gathered due to their secretive and brutal methods of keeping it. Rational Choice Theory is also a strategy that should be utilized. This theory will explain all the social phenomena in terms of rational calculations made by self-interested individuals. It will explain why the ISIS behave in the ways they do and thus countering them will have been made easier. It will also be used to get the history of ISIS and thus the future plans of the group. The last intelligence strategy that should be utilized is ‘know the enemy, think like the enemy’. This is getting to know their masters, what they are trying to accomplish and where they get their finances from. Their relationships with other Al Qaeda groups should also be considered. The most important intelligence however would be to know their strategy, the significance of their threats and where their weaknesses lie Recommendations ISIS US should stop the airstrike, since what people in US see , they got bad people, is seen by several in US, particularly the Sunnis president wants to convince to break with ISIS, as the US performing as the air force for the Shi”a and Kurds against the Sunnis. Hence, the air force defeats the crucial objective of ending known support for ISIS, and rather serves to support the extremist firm. Make a genuine commitment for no boots in the ground. White house sent around 1,300 pairs of boots to the ground in Iraq. The united state should stop flooding the area while armed that lead to more violence against the civilians, and finish its law of ignoring the violations of people’s right and international law dedicated by its allies. Categorize a genuine diplomatic relation to deal with ISIS. Even if the US is performing airstrikes and taking new troops in Iraq, everybody agrees there is no solution for military. So diplomacy should have a center stage. This means serious relation with Iran, among other parties involved. Tehran got influence than Washington in Baghdad. If people need to accept encouraging the government of Iraq to accept a comprehensive approach, the combined pressure from both Iran and United States have the best chances. Even if Iran is mostly Shi’ itself, the leaders of the country fear on the instability in their neighbor that result from the years of Shi’a sectarianism in Baghdad. Start a new search for bigger diplomatic explanations in the United Nations. That implies working together in building a real coalition which is aimed at deploying financial and diplomatic pressures, not the military strikes at the international l rank in Syria and Iraq. All the governments of regional have their worry. A true coalition is required not for military strikes but for a strong diplomacy. Conclusion In conclusion, ISIS is an insurgency group that has its roots from Al-Qaeda; the group is more organized with a strong military command and has grabbed large swathes of land in Iraq and Syria. The group is a terrorist organization in that it attacks and causes mayhem then executes those who do not convert into Islam. The Group is a threat to the Western countries in particular the United States and France, which are conducting airstrikes in the region. The group uses online communication platforms to spread its threats and propaganda. The group also has attracted fighters from about 60 countries across the world, and about 1000 of them come from the United Kingdom. Its major headquarters are located in Raqqa in Syria and operates in cross border in Iraq. On June 2013, the Group overran the Iraq military bases in the northern city of Mosul now under their control causing mass routing and executions of the captured Iraq forces. It is believed that those fighting alongside the ISIS are Americans who can travel back to the United States to conduct terrorist activities. Hence, the United States and its allies has regarded ISIS as the most brutal and dangerous terrorist organization in the world. Consequently, they are working on a plan to eliminate the group, which the United States says it will take time before the coalition dismantles the group. In this phenomenon, there is a high like hood of an eminent attack on the US soil from the revelations of the Iraq prime minister. According to the prime minister, he received intelligence that the group was in its final stages to attack the underground subways in the United States and France. In this scenario, these threats cannot be taken lightly because on September 11, 2001, whereby three thousand Americans lost their lives on an attack that Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility. After the attack, it gave birth to the fight against extremists and terrorists in their major bases in Afghanistan. Hence, this group needs to be treated with suspicion especially with increasing threat of terrorism in United States and other countries of the world ISIS has reinforced its power by recruiting several foreign volunteers in Syria and from United States and Europe and is expected to have around 10,000 people under its power. For the resources, ISIS it depends on huge extortion networks that are in Mosul. On February, it captured the gas field found in Conoco, and it said to generate thousands of dollars every week. Isis presents itself as an alternative to Al-Qaida in the community of jihad. ISIS is a terrorist group, but with extraordinary stress on organization. One to think of it like anything but a state if aims to be is misunderstanding the threat it pose. Bibliography Altamimi, Aymenni. “The Islamic State of Iraq and Alsham.” Aymennjawad.org. 2013. http://www.aymennjawad.org/14151/the-islamic-state-of-iraq-and-al-sham. Charles River Editors. The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria: The History of ISIS/ISIL. London: CreateSpace 2014. Clark, Robert Intelligence Analysis: A Target-Centric Approach. Washington, D.C.: CQ Press 2010. Gurcan, Metin. “ISIS Military strategy.” Academia. edu. Accessed 18 October 2014. http://www.academia.edu/7632564/ISIS_MILITARY_STRATEGY. 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