Could the United Nations Take Care of ISIS Themselves?
The United Nations. The peacekeeping force for the world. Yet the United States is leading the coalition against ISIS. Is the reason for this that the United Nations is too weak to stop ISIS?
The UN has 97,655 troops under their command. Every one of those troops is deployed throughout the world as of August 31, 2014. Only 1,271 UN troops are in Syria, and none are in Iraq (“Peacekeeping Fact Sheet. United Nations Peacekeeping.”). According to the UN fact sheet, the most UN military personnel in any one area is just over 21,000. The CIA recently released an estimate of 20,000–30,000 troops under the command of ISIS (“Number of ISIS fighters has swelled to as many as 31,500, CIA says.”).
The biggest UN force would be at a disadvantage. They have either the same numbers as ISIS, or significantly less. They are fighting on ground which ISIS is familiar with and will fight to keep. I believe that the ISIS fighters are also more willing to fight, and to kill, if it means that they will win. For those reasons I believe the United Nations cannot overcome ISIS by themselves.
To show the true size of the UN military, let’s compare it to the numbers for the US military.
The US military commands over 1.4 million troops (DoD Data/Reports”). This is over 14 times the size of the UN military. According to a Department of Defense release, over 35,000 US troops were killed or wounded in action in Operation Iraqi Freedom. This is about 1.75 times the total UN troops in one area, without counting the troops unharmed during that operation.
These numbers may be what are needed to overcome ISIS. If the UN had that many killed or wounded, only two-thirds of their forces could still fight. That is why I believe the United Nations should stay out of this conflict.
Works Cited
“DoD Casualty Release.” http://www.defense.gov/. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Oct. 2014. <http://www.defense.gov/news/casualty.pdf>.
“DoD Data/Reports.” www.dmdc.osd.mil/. N.p., n.d. Web. 5 Oct. 2014. <https://www.dmdc.osd.mil/appj/dwp/dwp_reports.jsp>.
“Number of ISIS fighters has swelled to as many as 31,500, CIA says.” Fox News. FOX News Network, 12 Sept. 2014. Web. 4 Oct. 2014. <http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/12/number-isis-fighters-has-swelled-to-as-many-as-31500-cia-says/>.
“Peacekeeping Fact Sheet. United Nations Peacekeeping.” UN News Center. UN, 31 Aug. 2014. Web. 5 Oct. 2014. <http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/resources/statistics/factsheet.shtml>.
“U.N. Peacekeepers Often Lack Supplies, Support.” NPR. NPR, 21 Sept. 2010. Web. 5 Oct. 2014. <http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130021491>.
