In December, I wrote a fairly lengthy post on Iraq and the Islamic State entitled “Did George W. Bush’s Invasion of Iraq Create the Islamic State?” Following up on the question of “the why” of the Islamic State (or ISIS or ISIL), former Defense Secretary Robert Gates talked with Business Insider on the two main factors that enabled the rise of ISIS. Here are some excerpts from the article:
“‘I think the primary reasons for the rise of ISIS are the Syrian civil war and the policies followed by the government in Baghdad,’ Gates told Business Insider on Monday. …
But the US still did perhaps play a role in the burgeoning conflict as well, Gates suggested.
‘You can argue all day long whether the absence of US forces had an impact on’ the rise of ISIS, Gates said, admitting that ‘the absence of senior leadership that was able to mitigate some of the sectarian conflicts in Iraq probably had some impact on the willingness of Maliki to follow these wrong policies.’ …
Maliki's ‘policies were so negative toward the Sunnis in Iraq that I think many Sunnis believed that ISIS would be better for them than the government in Baghdad,’ Gates said. ‘They’ve learned, to their sorrow, that that’s not true, but Maliki gave the Sunnis in Iraq no reason to resist ISIS because he was so anti-Sunni.’ …
‘Where I think our presence mattered was when we had senior military officers1 in Baghdad, they were able to get the leaders of Baghdad from all of the different groups together, Sunnis, Shia, Kurds, and mediate some of these disputes and minimize some of the negative policies that were being followed by Maliki,’ Gates said. …
‘When we left, most of the leaders of the Iraqi Security Forces were people we’d had a hand in training, and in some cases selecting, and they were pretty capable people,’ Gates said, referring to the Iraqi army that US forces helped train and build up.
‘Well, Maliki replaced all of those people with a bunch of political hacks who were incompetent and corrupt and no Iraqi soldier was going to fight for them, as we saw in Mosul.’”
Over the weekend, President Obama said that the Iran nuclear agreement was the result of “smart, patient and disciplined” diplomacy. The rise of ISIS appears to have been, in part, the result of the absence of such diplomacy.
---------
1 And diplomats like Ryan Crocker.
Comments