ISIS: Remaining and Expanding

[Magda Hassan]

Iraq's "World Of Hurt"

The Jihadists of ISIS in cooperation with former Baathists continue their march onto Baghdad. Their recent surprise seizure of Mosul and further operations seem to have been well prepared for quite a long time:

"These groups were unified by the same goal, which is getting rid of this sectarian government, ending this corrupt army and negotiating to form the Sunni Region," said Abu Karam, a senior Baathist leader and a former high-ranking army officer, who said planning for the offensive had begun two years ago. "The decisive battle will be in northern Baghdad. These groups will not stop in Tikrit and will keep moving toward Baghdad."

The alliance between former Baathist and followers of the naqshbandiya Sufi order with the radical takfirirs of ISIS is a dangerous one. The former are professional militaries and as Pat Lang assesses:

The speed and effective direction of this offensive seems to me to show the participation of such officers as Sabr- Abd al-Aziz al-Douri. If that is the case, then Maliki's army is in a real "world of hurt."

It is not clear what "Maliki's army" actually is. The Iraqi army officers of the divisions near Mosul seem to have been bought off and changed sides. Some 90,000 security forces deserted.
But its is unlikely that the Sunni forces, the Baathist and ISIS, can take Baghdad or even hold the ground they have taken so far. "Maliki's army" will be unlike the "Iraqi army". There are loyal divisions in the Iraqi military and there are many Shia now joining voluntary forces. The Shia authority in Iraq, Ayatollah Sistani, has issued a fatwa and called for war against the Sunni takfiris. Hundreds of thousand will follow that call.
Maliki's forces may be in a "world of hurt" for now but my guess it that they, in the end, will also win. They have more and better resources, access to the sea and support from Iran and likely also the United States. The Sunni positions have no defensible geographic features. The fight will be about cities on flat land and those can be starved and bombed into submission. Disunity within the Sunni forces will also evolve. In Syria ISIS did not do well with other anti-government forces, often fighting against them. The Sunni Sufi/Baathist followers of Izzat Ibrahim, a vice president under Saddam Hussein, will soon revolt against the radical life style ISIS will try to impose on the areas both groups hold. The more nasty force of those two will win internally only to be then stomped into ground by superior Shia forces.
As those two main groups struggle against each others the Kurds up north will be, for now, the laughing third. They already took Kirkuk, the oil-rich mixed Arab-Kurd city up north, and will not let it go without violence. They will be the next target when the Sunni Shia fight has been decided for either side.
All sides will bleed and, thanks to the U.S. war of terror, all Iraqis will contine to be in a "world of hurt" for years to come.
http://www.moonofalabama.org/