Islamic State troops firing from a captured US Humvee. Social media
Pamela Engel, Business Insider: 3 big assumptions in the anti-ISIS fight have all turned out to be false
The efforts of a US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State militant group in Iraq and Syria have been centered on three big assumptions that haven't held up very well over the past year, according to a note from The Soufan Group.
It has been one year since the fall of Mosul in Iraq — during the group's territory-seizing rampage across Iraq and Syria — and Iraqi forces still aren't close to getting it back.
US officials have faced criticism about the Obama administration's strategy, which is built around certain key assumptions that haven't panned out.
The Soufan Group notes that the assumptions are:
(1) That the Iraq military would be reformed simply by being retrained and re-equipped;
(2) That Iraq's Sunni population would rise up en masse against the Islamic State;
(3) That countering the Islamic State's social-media narrative would be effective.
WNU Editor: I concur with this analysis .... and to its analysis on why these 3 assumptions are "false". (1) It will take a long time to reform the Iraqi army .... and because of it sectarian nature (coupled with corruption) .... probably a few years .... if not longer. (2) The Shiite dominated Baghdad government does not trust the Sunnis and Kurds .... and will never give them the weapons to combat the Islamic State. (3) Instead of countering the Islamic State's social message .... they should wage all out war on it .... crash their servers and ban them from popular social networks is a good start.
Posts
