My take on the Iraq and ISIS situation

So if you’ve been paying attention to world news lately, you already know the nation of Iraq is in a deep state of turmoil right now. I wanted to give my take on the situation and how I think this will all eventually play out. While I’m no expert on the Middle East, I have been following the region since the United States invaded Iraq and I think that should count for something.

 

I can’t help but chuckle a little when I see or hear these pseudo-progressives saying we never should have invaded Iraq, when they were singing a completely different tune 11 years ago. So where the hell were you guys when Bush and his sycophants were spewing all the hype about WMD bullshit? I remember exactly what you all were doing at the time. When Bush’s approval rating was up to 90% many of you were shouting down the few people brave enough to speak out and calling us “traitors” and “un-American”. It’s not very nice to say, “I told ya so” but fuck it I’m rubbing ya’ll’s faces into it this time.

 

Anyways, now back onto how I think this situation will eventually unfold. I do think the Obama Administration is true to their word and that we will try as hard as we can to re-deploy as little military assistance as possible. These 300 military advisers that are now in Iraq and advising the Iraqi Security Forces is Obama betting that Iraq (with help from Iran) can fix the problem on their own. However, on the other-hand I don’t see the United States continuing to not do much, especially if this conflict starts to destabilize the rest of the Middle East. That’s when we will definitely play a more active role and start fighting ISIS. Much of the U.S. economy is still very dependent on oil and too much has been invested to just simply let it all go.

For those who think the ‘Islamic State of Iraq and Syria’ is just a small bunch of inexperienced & ineffective fighters, you clearly do not understand the situation. The ISIS fighters and groups affiliated with them are NOT new when it comes to modern warfare as many of them have been fighting for years in Syria back when the Arab Spring started in December 2010. The Syrian government have a modern military at their disposal and they are unable to control much of their country because of these guys. Additionally, I keep seeing tweets from a lot of Muslims who are posting tweets that strongly indicate ISIS is getting big financial support originating from Saudi Arabia.

 

Also did you ever wonder how ISIS managed to take over much of Iraq so quickly? Regardless of how experienced their fighters are, no one can take over half a country that fast…. not without MAJOR help. There’s something the mainstream media is hardly covering and it is this. It’s not just foreign militants who are going against the Iraqi government but also many of the Iraqi Sunnis are backing them up as well!! They feel that the current Iraqi government is oppressive towards them, they show preferential treatment towards Shia Muslims and they’re tired of it. So ISIS is quite capable of staying in this for the long run as they have experienced fighters, moral support from Sunni Iraqi’s and getting lots of cash.

 

Now Iraqi President Maliki is desperately trying to diffuse the situation by promising to put in a new government that’s more inclusive for both Sunni Muslims and the Kurds. However, the Kurds have more or less stated that they aren’t interested and have hinted at declaring independence. Additionally, the Kurds have also stated they are not leaving the city of Kirkuk once the dust settles and plan to fight for it til the bitter end. Now when the U.S. had asked the Kurds to leave Kirkuk during the 2nd Iraq War, they did indeed do so but I honestly don’t see them doing that this time. Since Kirkuk is a very oil-rich city, this can easily turn into a bloody battle between the Kurds and the Iraqi government in the future. You have large masses of people rallying against a government and declaring independence. That’s revolutionary talk and as soon as that gets set into motion it’s almost impossible to stop it and not spill lots of blood. So I have a feeling that President Maliki’s promises for reconciliation may be too little too late.

 

If anything good that could possibly come out of this, I  do hope the Kurds can finally have their own country where they’re in complete control of their destiny as a people. They are one of the largest stateless ethnic groups out there and are surrounded by people who hate them.

 

Now is the Iraqi government capable of re-taking all of the lost territory? With the backing of the United States and now Russia joining to help, the odds are for the time being in their favor. However, I don’t see it happening for a while. There’s also something else to take into consideration too. If the Iraqi Security Forces start bombing ISIS then they will also be killing Iraqis and there’s no dodging this since much of the Sunni population are supporting them. They already hate the Shia-led government so this will do nothing for reconciliation and same also applies if the United States started attacking them directly. So at the moment the government of Iraq is stuck between a rock and a hard place.

There’s already a few reports out saying Iraq is starting to retake certain cities and things are slowly going back to normal. But how accurate is that really? Earlier today, I pulled up an article where the U.S. is sending yet another 300 troops to protect the embassy and U.S. citizens. People don’t normally double their security detail if a situation is improving and this implicates that matters may very well be getting worse. Something tells me that this all is just the beginning, and regardless of who wins many lives are going to be lost….

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