Solsticewitch13's BOS: Expecting the Iraqi Army to Beat ISIS May Be Unrealistic

Tuesday, May 19, 2015

Obama’s ISIS strategy depends, officially, on the Iraqi military beating ISIS.

On paper it should be simple enough. We give them the equipment. We fly air support for them. All they have to do is push out a large gang of insurgents.

Historically though, our luck with backing an unstable government’s campaign against a motivated insurgency has been uneven. At best.

Expecting the Iraqi army to perform may be extremely unrealistic for several reasons.

1. Arab armies are not exactly noted for standing and fighting when things don’t go too well. The collapse of Arab armies against Israel in multiple wars is an obvious example, but even subtracting Israel, there isn’t much of an impressive 20th century record there.

The Iraqi military collapsed quickly when facing the United States. They couldn’t have won, but they didn’t put up much of a notable fight either. Saddam kept Iraq in the fight against Iran through sheer terror. Defection or retreat would mean having your family executed.

20th century Arab on Arab wars are often more of a brutal comedy routine in which one side runs away and the other side massacres everyone. That is what has been going on in Iraq.

Arabs tend to vacillate between unrealistic expectations of victory and equally unrealistic certainty of defeat. Propaganda pumps up everyone with the certainty that an easy win is coming. When setbacks occur, the certainty flips the other way as everyone believes that all is completely lost. This has been the pattern with the various ISIS victories.

2. Iraq has been rotten through by Iranian agents. Iraq’s Shiite government is an Iran client and Iran wants to undermine the military as much as possible and make everything reliant on Shiite militias. That’s the real secret behind ISIS’ big victories.

The Iraqi military is dependent on Shiite officers put in place by Maliki who abandon ship at just the wrong moment, whether because of a conspiracy or because the going gets too tough. Everyone else starts running for it. Do it enough times and it becomes a pattern.

Iraqi soldiers have no confidence in their officers. They increasingly don’t expect to win. And they’re fighting Western style against an insurgency, which isn’t in their comfort zone.

This isn’t a call for putting troops on the ground in Iraq, but the current strategy is problematic. ISIS is getting fresh recruits. Each victory plumps up its religious narrative. And that also means that it gains international sway and encourages more attacks in the US and around the world. If it can continue hanging on, then like every guerrilla movement, it wins.