Obliterating Islamic State (ISIS)
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
haha
Which is specifically why the Russians have got it right on this one, the West is busily backing 50,000 groups which have little in common and are more likely to be shooting at each other when Assad isn't around while the Russians have picked a single entity to deal with and back.
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
Well it is fortuitous that I chose to read Spiegel Online this morning then isnt it as it would appear Micheal Flynn does not agree with you and describes the invasion of Iraq as "A huge error".
Ironic that it has taken Americans 12 years to figure out what the world told them 12 years ago.
Ex-US Intelligence Chief on Islamic State's Rise: 'We Were Too Dumb'
Interview Conducted By Matthias Gebauer and Holger Stark
Without the Iraq war, Islamic State wouldn't exist today, former US special forces chief Mike Flynn openly admits. In an interview, he explains IS' rise to become a professional force and how the Americans allowed its future leader to slip out of their hands.
Michael Flynn, 56, served in the United States Army for more than 30 years, most recently as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, where he was the nation's highest-ranking military intelligence officer. Previously, he served as assistant director of national intelligence inside the Obama administration. From 2004 to 2007, he was stationed in Afghanistan and Iraq, where, as commander of the US special forces, he hunted top al-Qaida terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, one of the predecessors to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who today heads the Islamic State (IS) in Syria and Iraq. After Flynn's team located Zarqawi's whereabouts, the US killed the terrorist in an air strike in June 2006.
In an interview, Flynn explains the rise of the Islamic State and how the blinding emotions of 9/11 led the United States in the wrong direction strategically.
http://www.spiegel.de/international...ef-discusses-development-of-is-a-1065131.html
I disagree totally with him :the invasion of Iraq was not a strategic failure, it was a must .
after the first Gulf War, Saddam was legally restrained : one of the conditions he had to obey was not to make ABC weapons and to give UN inspectors access to his factories : he refused this access ( I still remember the pictures) and this ALONE was enough to invade Iraq .
after 9/11 he publickly rejoiced and this also was enough to attack him .
These two points were a compelling necessity to invade Iraq : Bush would have violated his oath if he had done nothing : it was his duty to protect the American people,and the attitude of Saddam led to the presumption that he had ABC weapons and was thus a threat to the US :after 9/11 no one in the US would trust an Arab with ABC weapons .
The mistakes were made later:
it should have been possible to attack Saddam in october 2001,but the legalists, liberals and submarines (Powell) in the Bush administration prevented this .
It should have been possible to eliminate Saddam only (by the intervention of the CIA) and to replace him by someone as ruthless as Saddam ,but who would do what Washington said .But the legalists,liberals,submarines and the media prevented this by saying that the US were coming to liberate Iraq: that was the most stupid thing one could do .But one can trust the legalists,liberals,submarines and media to push to do such things .
Who was the wise guy who emptied the Iraqi prisons and let escape al this scum ?
after the first Gulf War, Saddam was legally restrained : one of the conditions he had to obey was not to make ABC weapons and to give UN inspectors access to his factories : he refused this access ( I still remember the pictures) and this ALONE was enough to invade Iraq .
after 9/11 he publickly rejoiced and this also was enough to attack him .
These two points were a compelling necessity to invade Iraq : Bush would have violated his oath if he had done nothing : it was his duty to protect the American people,and the attitude of Saddam led to the presumption that he had ABC weapons and was thus a threat to the US :after 9/11 no one in the US would trust an Arab with ABC weapons .
The mistakes were made later:
it should have been possible to attack Saddam in october 2001,but the legalists, liberals and submarines (Powell) in the Bush administration prevented this .
It should have been possible to eliminate Saddam only (by the intervention of the CIA) and to replace him by someone as ruthless as Saddam ,but who would do what Washington said .But the legalists,liberals,submarines and the media prevented this by saying that the US were coming to liberate Iraq: that was the most stupid thing one could do .But one can trust the legalists,liberals,submarines and media to push to do such things .
Who was the wise guy who emptied the Iraqi prisons and let escape al this scum ?
Food for thought Saddam killed > 250 thousand of his own people mostly Kurds and Shiites (the very same people ISIS hopes to wipe out). In the ISIS struggle ~ 250 thousand have died - been killed. Who is worse, who is better? It's a no winner either way for the Iraqi people. To chafe under a murderous Stalinist dictator or to be subject to a murderous terrorist group of thugs.
ISIS may have somehow evolved indirectly as a result of actions taken some time ago by the US - Allies against Saddam, this is easy to say, using 20-20 hindsight. However I highly dought that the US thought for 1 minute that their actions would one day result in the result in the formation of a gang - terrorist group such as ISIS. It happened to evolve out of the ashes of war and instability that is so typical of the ME. I will agree had the 2nd invasion been handled differently the present scenario may not exist.
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This is warped to replace Saddam with who chemical Ali. The man killed > 250 thousand of his own people. You suggest replacing him with another sadistic ruthless murderer who would be just as evil? This should never be American policy.
The best thing anyone can do against ISIS is to attack their economy. capture their oil fields, destroy their drug plants, stop them from getting hold of ancient artifacts, rescue the people they kidnap without paying ransoms. This strategy even if it doesn't kill ISIS will greatly weaken them to the point they can no longer function as an independent nation (which at this point it pretty much is). It worked against the Confederates and Plains Indians in the 1800s, it also nearly worked and outright worked in both world wars less than a century later.
Sara
Shepherdess
What's ironic is that you take this article and pick out quotes which suit your opinion of America as an opportunity to validate your own.
I don't think it took Americans 12 years to "figure out" what "the world" told them at all. Members of our military have the freedom to speak publicly about their opinions and lessons learned; that says a lot about our country.
More quotes from the article:
SPIEGEL : What has caused the organization to shift its tactics and to now operate internationally?
Flynn: There were all kinds of strategic and tactical warnings and lots of reporting......, in Europe, there is a leadership structure. And there's likely a leader or a leadership structure in each country in Europe. The same is probably similar for the United States, but just not obvious yet.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Islamic State's leader is the self-proclaimed Caliph Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. What kind of leader is he?
Flynn: Bin Laden and Zawahiri sit in their videos, legs crossed, flag behind them, ... presenting themselves as warriors. Baghdadi brought himself to a mosque in Mosul and spoke from the balcony, like the pope, dressed in appropriate black garb. He stood there as a holy cleric and proclaimed the Islamic caliphate. That was a very, very symbolic act. It elevated the fight from this sort of military, tactical and localized conflict to that of a religious and global war.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: What would change if al-Baghdadi were killed?
Flynn: We used to say, "We'll just keep killing the leaders, and the next guy up is not going to be as good." That didn't work out that way.....
SPIEGEL ONLINE: So killing Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi wouldn't change much?
Flynn: Not at all. He could be dead today, you haven't seen him lately. I would have much preferred to have captured bin Ladin and Zarqawi ....as soon as you kill them, you are actually doing them a favor by making them and their movement a favor by making them martyrs. Zarqawi was a vicious animal. I would have preferred to see him live in a cell for the rest of his life. Their logic is still hard to understand for us in the West.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: What differentiates al-Baghdadi from Zarqawi, who led al-Qaida in Iraq between 2003 and 2006?
Flynn: Zarqawi tried to bring in foreign fighters, but not in the way that al-Baghdadi has been able to do......He's using the modern weapons of the information age in fundamentally different ways to strengthen the attraction of their ideology. Al-Baghdadi is much smarter and more precise in his target selection, but still very vicious.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: Who is running the military wing of the Islamic State?
Flynn: I think that al-Baghdadi or the current leader of the Islamic State is very hands-on when it comes to parts of the military....
SPIEGEL ONLINE: How should the West fight this enemy?
Flynn: The sad fact is that we have to put troops on the ground. We won't succeed against this enemy with air strikes alone. But a military solution is not the end all, be all.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: A Western military intervention runs the risk of being seen as a new attempt to invade the region.
Flynn: That's why we need the Arabs as partners, they must be the face of the mission -- but, today, they are neither capable of conducting nor leading this type of operation, only the United States can do this. And we don't want to invade or even own Syria. Our message must be that we want to help and that we will leave once the problems have been solved.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: In 2004, you already had Baghdadi in your hands -- he was imprisoned in in a military camp, but got cleared later as harmless by a US military commission. How could that fatal mistake happen?
Flynn: We were too dumb. We didn't understand who we had there at that moment. When 9/11 occurred, all the emotions took over... Instead of asking why they attacked us, we asked where they came from.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: The US invaded Iraq even though Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11.
Flynn: First we went to Afghanistan, where al-Qaida was based. Then we went into Iraq. Instead of asking ourselves why the phenomenon of terror occurred, we were looking for locations. This is a major lesson we must learn in order not to make the same mistakes again.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: The Islamic State wouldn't be where it is now without the fall of Baghdad. Do you regret ...
Flynn: ... yes, absolutely ...
SPIEGEL ONLINE: ... the Iraq war?
Flynn: It was huge error. As brutal as Saddam Hussein was, it was a mistake to just eliminate him. The same is true for Moammar Gadhafi and for Libya, which is now a failed state. The historic lesson is that it was a strategic failure to go into Iraq. History will not be and should not be kind with that decision.
It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.
When you see a rattlesnake poised to strike, you do not wait until he has struck to crush him.
We have always held to the hope, the belief, the conviction that there is a better life, a better world, beyond the horizon.
~ Franklin D. Roosevelt
And,who will do this ? Not the US, not the Iraqi "army" (which is not good at all),not Iran ,because the presence of ISIS in Iraq is benefiting to Iran .
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
I didn't pick and choose any quotes from the article I just posted the opening sentence as a teaser because the whole article was 12000 characters and a post can only be 10000 characters and linked the whole article rather than butcher it.
On the whole I agree with pretty much everything in the story.
Oh and the obligatory counter quote...
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
But in doing this you are almost recognising them as a nation which is dangerous in itself.
I think our mistake is that we are still trying to "understand" them and are treating them with caution when the simple fact is that they are little more than a cult of death, they are either killing or dying and I would prefer it be the later.
Sara
Shepherdess
How witty......
When I lose something, I always find it in the last place I look. I'm guessing that you never lose anything....but then that's my first guess, so I'm probably wrong.
After all, I am an American.
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MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
How witty......
When I lose something, I always find it in the last place I look. I'm guessing that you never lose anything....but then that's my first guess, so I'm probably wrong.
After all, I am an American.
Nothing is ever lost as it is always in the last place it was put as such you always know where it is consequently it can not be lost.
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They consider themselves to be a Caliphate. They absolutely require oil revues to continue to fund their organization. By destroying the oil wells and oil facilities this effectively cripples ISIS. Also by destroying their weapons and arms producing facilities ISIS can be dealt a major blow. After all they have to arm themselves and they only have so much left over American equipment and other ill gotten gains. If they don’t have money and arms then how do they train new recruits? If they don’t have money and arms how do they seize and keep territory?
A week long focused air campaign of heavy bombing by the Russians using the SU-24 and SU-34 bombers “after the downing of the airliner” was resulting in such damage. However now they have shifted to again spending more effort bombing the rebels fighting for democracy then bombing ISIS. Fortunately the French and to a lesser extent the Allies are still bombing ISIS but not to quite the extent the Russians did.
More heavily arming the Kurds is a good option since they are not looking for troops but could use heavy weapons to counter ISIS AFV’s and artillery.
It’s easy to say just kill them. But in reality one must have strategies and mechanism for doing so. These are just a couple.
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
We are just back to this circular argument again so for the last time I will reiterate my position/opinion on this issue.
ISIS are nothing more than a cult of death, we do not need to understand them as there can be no negotiation with them (as they want it all) as such there can be no co-existence with them.
The answer (in my opinion):
My preference is to turn the job of dealing with ISIS in Syria over to the Russians and Iranians to deal with however they see fit (basically it means at least temporarily Assad stays) but it must also include a full military campaign to remove their control of territory aka land sea and air combat.
This means throwing the Syrian rebels under the bus but so what, in the rebels we are not backing the side that will give us a peaceful conclusion as if they win they will happily slaughter Assads followers and each other we are only picking the survivors.
The West will have to do the same in Iraq which means committing ground forces to support the Kurds and whatever forces Iraq calls its army that are actually willing to fight, the cost of this to Iraq and Turkey should be our support of an independent Kurdistan as the Kurds have proven themselves over and over to be reliable allies and good fighters that are not hell bent on conquest.
The current air campaign is doomed to failure unless it is supported by a meaningful ground action.
This will not end ISIS as a terrorist organisation but it will greatly reduce their recruiting power and financial capacity.
Done.
ISIS are nothing more than a cult of death, we do not need to understand them as there can be no negotiation with them (as they want it all) as such there can be no co-existence with them.
The answer (in my opinion):
My preference is to turn the job of dealing with ISIS in Syria over to the Russians and Iranians to deal with however they see fit (basically it means at least temporarily Assad stays) but it must also include a full military campaign to remove their control of territory aka land sea and air combat.
This means throwing the Syrian rebels under the bus but so what, in the rebels we are not backing the side that will give us a peaceful conclusion as if they win they will happily slaughter Assads followers and each other we are only picking the survivors.
The West will have to do the same in Iraq which means committing ground forces to support the Kurds and whatever forces Iraq calls its army that are actually willing to fight, the cost of this to Iraq and Turkey should be our support of an independent Kurdistan as the Kurds have proven themselves over and over to be reliable allies and good fighters that are not hell bent on conquest.
The current air campaign is doomed to failure unless it is supported by a meaningful ground action.
This will not end ISIS as a terrorist organisation but it will greatly reduce their recruiting power and financial capacity.
Done.
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Complete victory cannot be achieved solely from the air. I’ve stated this on many previous post. However it can go a long way towards victory: destroying ISIS’s Oil revues, infrastructure and organization as a whole. I will explain in detail.
Iran wants to use ISIS to extend it’s own influence to become the regional power. They are a terrorist state. The Russian are more concerned with wiping out the Syrian rebels groups. There has been reports of collusion between Assad and ISIS over the joint use of power plants. As such the Iranian – Russian solution is unlikely to defeat ISIS.
The West will bomb ISIS on a limited bases while continuing to train and lightly arm both the Kurds and Syrian rebels. The current groups the Kurds, the Syrian rebels and remnant Iraqi army can at best keep ISIS at bay with a seesaw type war with no clear-cut winner or loser.
This bombing could be accomplished using the B-52 stratofortress. The ISIS organization and infrastructure would be reduced to a fraction of itself. Note: This is the same type of bombing that brought N. Vietnam and Saddam to their knees. We can locate these facilities, weapons using SAR radars and bomb them like nobody else on the planet, if we chose to do so. Unfortunately this will result in considerable collateral damage. Still ground forces would be needed for mopping up, after such an extensive air campaign took place (which is unlikely). The West is leery of committing ground forces (and rightfully so). However this is how the war could be won.
brinktk
Active member
I agree.
Except for the understanding part...we do need to understand what compels people to be attracted to the narrative they sell. We need to understand how someone goes from being a normal person to a rebel massacring people. If we refuse to understand it, then we can't invalidate that narrative until it is too late for those being radicalized.
Getting an enemy to surrender of their own will is much preferable to simply killing them.
Just curious what you agree to? The Russians are unlikely to engage large scale land forces against ISIS. Do you prefer an Iranian dominated ME. Even if the west were to allow it? Kind of exchanging one terrorist organization for another. The Syrian rebels are not a powerful military option but at least they like the Kurds are freedom fighters.
Unfortunately Turkey (and Iran I might add) will never support an independent Kurdistan since the Kurdistan also extends into Iran and Turkey.
However I have the humility to admit that I’m no authority on the ME, who is.
MontyB
All-Blacks Supporter
I certainly agree we need to work on what drives people to join these groups but I am not sure we need to come to an understanding on ISIS to achieve that as it is more the social aspect of our own societies that we need to focus on.
Personally I am not sure I want ISIS followers to just give up and go home because I think they are the sort of people that will simply sign up to the next loony cause and we will be facing them again over some other issue.