Doing ISIS’s job for them

My newest piece at LobeLog is based on having watched a whole slew of panel discussions that have been happening around DC lately, assessing the first year or so of the anti-ISIS air campaign. The results have been mixed at best, with one analyst, Hassan Hassan from Chatham House (who has literally written the book on ISIS, or at least a book on ISIS), suggesting that the air campaign is actually driving recruits to the organization as it wrecks local economies in Syria and leaves desperate families with no other way to sustain themselves:

But Hassan actually went further than [the Center for American Progress’s Brian] Katulis and others who have criticized the air campaign’s ineffectiveness. He told the Atlantic Council audience that the bombing may (at least in Syria) be driving new recruits to the Islamic State:

We’ve seen a fascinating report by The Financial Times that ISIS still earns $1.5 million a day from oil alone. So that calls into question the impact of the air campaign that is targeting the financial roots of ISIS. Now, it’s not only ineffective, but it’s also counter-productive when it comes to the local population…more people are now joining ISIS because they have no other choice but to join the group. Everyone from communities living under ISIS would say that there is a general suspicion against ISIS. People suspect it, people don’t trust it, people fear it, and they always deal with it as a temporary ruler of their areas.

But at the same time, desperate families have started to allow their sons to join ISIS, because of two things. The first one is that the airstrikes have disrupted a wartime economy that was functioning before ISIS came. One of the family members would go and work in oil, for example…people could operate their heavy vehicles and engines to pump water from the Euphrates River and the Tigris River for agricultural lands. Because the airstrikes have disrupted this economy, people have no other choice. I notice that families do either of two things: get their sons to join ISIS, or send their sons to Europe as refugees…or both.

Please go check it out!

Hey, thanks for reading! If you come here often, and you like what I do, would you please consider contributing something (sorry, that page is a work in progress) to keeping this place running and me out of debtor’s prison? Also, while you’re out there on the internet tubes, please consider liking this blog’s Facebook page and following me on Twitter! Thank you!