The self-ascribed Islamic State is undoubtedly on the defensive, having recently lost control of cities and towns across Iraq and Syria such as Kobane, al-Qaryatain, Tikrit, Manbji, and Fallujah. When the town of Manbji in northern Syria was liberated from IS in August, the atmosphere was celebratory. Men cut off each others beards in the street, women ripped veils from their faces and burned them, and one old woman laughed as she puffed on a cigarette. It was obvious that the citizens of Manbji had been severely oppressed by the terror group, and they relished enjoying the freedoms which had been taken away from them by IS.
If only it were all that simple.
As the battle for the last IS held major city in Iraq, Mosul, now rages full force it has become abundantly clear that they will not go down without putting up a brutal fight. As coalition forces fight their way towards the city, the UN human rights office has begun to warn about the potential use of civilians as human shields. They are currently investigating reports that in anticipation of the fight IS is forcing 200 families to walk from the village of Samalia to Mosul, as well as another 350 families reportedly being moved into Mosul from their village of Najafia. It is likely that IS intends to use these families as human shields in what they know will be a losing defensive – ultimately opting to kill the civilians rather than allowing them to be liberated.
Camps are currently being constructed south, east, and north of Mosul in anticipation of the flood of people expected to flee the city as fighting intensifies. So far just over 4,000 people have fled Mosul and nearby areas in contrast to the million that are expected to – an extremely concerning set up for the urban battle to come.
Meanwhile, on Friday morning IS launched an attack on the Iraqi city of Kirkuk in an attempt to distract from their inevitable loss in Mosul. Suicide bombers hit four police stations in the city while gunmen killed officers and an electricity station outside town was bombed, killing at least thirteen employees there. Reports of casualties currently range and the fate of the city remains unclear.
What seems like it should be more clear is the inevitable downfall of IS. Despite their stubbornness, they have already lost over half of their self proclaimed caliphate by now, and face enemies including the Russian, Turkish, Iraqi, Syrian, and Kurdish forces with U.S. air power and logistical support. How such a David and Goliath battle could persist for much longer seems incomprehensible, yet the extremists’ resolve only seems to intensify alongside the attacks against them. IS has made it clear by now that they will go to any means necessary to preserve their caliphate until the last possible moment, with no regard for any human life. In essence, when you think you have God on your side you don’t quit.
That of course, begs the question of whether this is a war that can ever be won. Even if IS in its current form can be sufficiently stamped out by allied forces, what’s to keep their ideology from manifesting again in a different form – after all what are they but the natural evolution of now less relevant groups like Al-Qaeda and the Taliban? Even though our moral imperatives always seem so clear in the moment, it’s hard not to wonder if the U.S. is simply engaging in repeated short-sighted consequentialism at its worst. If we engage in war with no end goal, no time-table for exit or concrete plan for governance upon that exit, we are setting nations up for failure.
John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson’s Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara was a seen as genius in his day, a savant when it came to calculating the efficiency of our escalating war in Vietnam. He meticulously analyzed how many troops we would need, how to make the best use of weapons, etc. - by all account he had a genius military mind. His hamartia came in the lack of context with which he viewed the war. Wars are not moral equations to be solved with x number of troops, drone strikes, or bombing campaigns. They are attempts by various actors to establish what German philosopher Max Weber would describe as “a monopoly the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory”, a defining factor of any modern state.
Every actor has their own intentions, none of them quite as simple as the catch-all “fighting Islamic extremism." Putin wants to preserve a foothold in the Middle East and isn’t half as concerned with collateral damage as Obama, so he’ll go to any means necessary to prop up Syrian dictator Assad who has committed such atrocities as using chemical weapons against his own citizens. The Kurds and their Peshmerga forces currently control much of Northern Iraq and want to establish a state of their own. The U.S. has been unable to extricate ourselves from various messes and daisy-chains of military involvement throughout the region ever since our fatally misguided invasion of Iraq by the Bush Administration (which the editorial board of the Washington Post, just about all of Congress including Hillary Clinton, and even Donald Trump all supported at the time).
Our next President will face enormously consequential decisions about the role our military should play in Syria and Yemen. As the state of the race stands now it’s hard to imagine that the underlying philosophy driving current policy will change much, short of becoming slightly more hawkish under a Clinton Administration. Of course that’s not to say the unpredictability of a Trump Administration doing just about anything from yanking all forces from the region to making it his military sandbox would in any way be better. Rather, it reflects the reality that when it comes to the Middle East we’re stuck between a rock and a hard place that we won’t be getting out of anytime soon.
