The United States Aid in Forming the Islamic State
When thinking about the events that occurred on September 11th in relation to a terrorist organization, al Qaeda would be the first to come to mind for many, if not all people. While al-Qaeda was the perpetrator of the attack, the extreme Jihadist group currently calling itself the Islamic State (IS; also widely referred to by its former name ISIS) is also connected. Not because they were involved in the planning or execution of this act of terrorism, but because this event sparked a chain reaction that resulted in IS’s inception. As painful as it is to say, at multiple times the United States actions following 9/11 aided in creating an environment in which one of the most extreme and influential terrorist organizations could not only exist but also prosper. The foundation for what is today called IS to be built began with the United States invasion of Iraq and was perpetuated by the misunderstanding of the structure and motives of terrorist organizations. By failing to recognize many aspects of these organizations goals, the United States allowed for a small terrorist group to grow into one of the most widely recognized threats to western society.
In order to understand the roots of IS it would be insufficient to begin by looking at the history of the organization using that title today. To understand the origins of IS in entirety it is important to understand the concept of Jihad and be able to differentiate it from how it is defined by westerners today. Americans were first widely introduced to this term after September 11th and have therefore thought it to be synonymous with the idea of Islamic extremists using terrorism to fight a holy war. While some radical Muslims who despise America may act in accord with these stereotypes, it does not fully explain the concept. It is more accurately defined by Daniel Pipes (2003), a former professor and nominee to the United States Institution of Peace by President Bush as “the constant struggle of Muslims to conquer their inner base instincts, to follow the path of God, and to do good in society.” But IS and other terrorist groups have taken this concept to the extreme and their actions have shared the western perception of Jihad.
ABU MUSAB AL-ZARQAWI
This radical perception of Jihad was adopted by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian street criminal who served time in prison alongside the radical Islamist propagandist and spiritual leader, Abu Mohammed al-Maqdisi (Terrill, 2016). Maqdisi became the leader of the prison and spread the message of radical Islam to many others, but Zarqawi resonated with it to the point of devoting his entire life to it. After Zarqawi was released, he fled Jordan and formed a small terrorist group in Afghanistan. Zarqawi’s hopes were to conspire with Osama bin Laden, but the al Qaeda leader had no desire of meeting with a small time criminal. In early 2002, Zarqawi knew an attack on Iraq by the United States was imminent. So along with his followers, they invaded an area of Kurdish Iraq, not under control by Saddam Hussein, with the purpose of waging war against the Iraqi government (Terrill, 2016). In Secretary of State Colin Powell’s February 2003 speech to the United Nations to justify an invasion of Iraq, he insisted the only reason that Zarqawi could be in Iraq was in refuge provided by Hussein. Powell made these assertions despite knowing that Zarqawi, along with the Kurds, viewed Hussein’s policies toward themselves as genocidal (Terrill, 2016). Although Powell making false accusations of a low level terrorist, not even recognized by Osama bin Laden, may seem like a minor mistake on the surface, it was in fact the first of many times in which a misunderstanding by the United States would have much greater consequences. By being given name recognition by the United States Secretary of State, Zarqawi quickly became a terrorist-celebrity of sorts and, consequently for the US, he was now able to raise money and gain recruits much easier.
At the same time as Zarqawi’s rise in status, the United States made a second huge mistake by sponsoring programs of de-Baathification and to dis-band the Iraqi Army. These acts were implemented by the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC), the provisional government of Iraq after former President Saddam Hussein, the leader of the Baath Socialist Party, fled from Iraq (Terrill, 2014). Ahmad Chalabi, a member of the IGC, unveiled the program rules that would “purge former members of the banned Arab Baath Socialist Party (Baath Party) from public office,” due to the “Baath Party being responsible for atrocities, crimes, and abuses must receive the full measure of retributive justice” (Hatch, 2005). The problem with this program was that it was created because of the social injustices committed by senior officials within the Baath party, while failing to distinguish the thousands of Iraqi citizens formerly affiliated with the Baath party who had no involvement in the government’s crimes. The citizens most targeted by these policies were Iraqi Sunnis who now felt looked down upon as citizens and believed this to be more of an act of “de-Sunnization” and revenge by the Shi’ites for the Sunnis’ time in power under Saddam Hussein (Terrill, 2016).
Although the United States quickly realized the mistake and tried to repeal the program, it was already too late. The Shi’ites had already begun using it within the government to suppress Iraqi Sunnis. Exploiting the fame given to him by the United States, Zarqawi used the Sunni feelings of suppression in order to recruit them to his now rapidly growing organization. By exploiting his newly recruited Sunni’s hatred for the Shi’ites position of power, Zarqawi was able to orchestrate a constant stream of car bombings and suicide attacks towards the Shi’ites. This led to Zarqawi, once thought to be a “semi-educated criminal turned jihadist,” becoming even more powerful, and soon he “emerged as a remarkably insightful and agile strategist” (Terrill, 2016). In the United States’ last interaction with Zarqawi, they very much overestimated the power that he possessed, but in a time of war that is a safer assumption that the opposite. In this case the U.S. made no assumption at all about the Zarqawi’s involvement and role of masterminding these attacks, but instead they attributed it to be nothing but irritated Baathists striking out blindly (Terrill, 2016). The reputation that Zarqawi had built was now only further perpetuated by the United States response to the Sunni uproar. If the United States had at least realized that Zarqawi was the organizer of these attacks officials could have had some understanding of his strategy and the amount of people he had recruited to follow him.
With a rapidly growing group of Iraqi Sunnis under his control and the confidence found by his success in the attacks against Shi’ite pilgrims, Zarqawi was now ready to try and create real political change within his country. He started off with the bombing of his home country of Jordan’s embassy in Baghdad to both seek revenge against Jordan and warn other countries from engaging in relations with Iraq. These bombings may have achieved some success in aiding his rise to power, but what caught the eye of Osama bin Laden were his strategically carried out attacks on the Iraqi Shi’ites. These were different than the initial attacks Zarqawi no longer sought revenge, but now desired to inflict chaos in Iraq. By using his organization of Sunni’s to bring terror to the Shi’ite people, his goal was to spark a civil war, bringing Iraq to its knees in an ungovernable state (Terrill, 2016).
The United States caught on to these attacks and was quickly able to determine that Zarqawi was involved. Although the United States was aware of his involvement, their understanding of Zarqawi had been lacking since they believed him to be involved with Hussein and their approach to handling him ever since then has been completely wrong. In the eyes of the United States, Zarqawi was not strategic enough to pull off these attacks alone. He was still considered a lower level terrorist that must be receiving orders from someone. Vice President Dick Cheney believed that person to be Hussein, so they spent their time pressuring the CIA to find a link between Hussein and Zarqawi (Terrill, 2016). One was never found because it did not exist. How this constitutes a failure for the United States and their understanding of Zarqawi is not because they believed he had ties to Hussein. It is because they failed to understand what his goal was and the methods he was using to achieve that goal. These were not attacks with the end result being human casualties, while that was a necessary step in the process, the U.S. failed to understand the strategy of terrorist leaders to undermine the occupation (Terrill, 2016). This had been Zarqawi’s intent all along, but the U.S. had failed to recognize it and therefore they were taking the wrong approach to handling him and the war on terror in general. Zarqawi was fighting for one main goal and that was to promote the future of Islam, not as a whole but the radical Jihad beliefs that oppose the Shi’ite people, and Zarqawi and his followers would have done anything to ensure that.
While the United States was digging for the nonexistent ties between Hussein and Zarqawi, Zarqawi had finally caught the attention of Osama bin Laden and the two met to form an agreement. After discussion the two decided that Zarqawi would become prince and leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq (IQA), creating a separate terrorist organization that still has some ties to the original al-Qaeda. This relationship was full of annoyance and opposition, due to the conflicting views of the two leaders. Zarqawi paid little attention to bin Laden and instead continued his anti-Shi’ite regime, by blatantly attacking civilians and institutions (Terrill, 2016). On the other hand, bin Laden had a more global goal for al-Qaeda and desired to improve its image with the Muslim population worldwide. This led to a stronger divide between the two terrorist groups with al-Qaeda maintaining the goals it has always had while AQI would become the predecessor to the Islamic State. In one of Zarqawi’s extreme attacks on Jordan, despite trying to justify it as an act against Israel and America, many Jordanian civilians and children were killed resulting in a great majority of the country turning against him, including King Abdullah (Terrill, 2014). When American and Jordanian forces came together, their joint intelligence proved to be enough to determine the location of Zarqawi and kill him in an airstrike in 2006 (Terrill, 2014). Although this had a major impact on AQI, nearly disbanding it, it seems that Zarqawi’s successor, Abu Hamza al-Muhajir, was correct when saying: “Do not rejoice that you killed (al-Zarqawi), he has left behind lions that … trained under him,” because after a short time the Syrian revolution once again revitalized AQI (Reed, 2006).
THE POST-ZARQAWI CREATION OF THE ISLAMIC STATE
Now it has been many years since the death of Zarqawi and the terrorist organization that he built is thriving, regarded as one of the largest in its new territory, but it is not necessarily due to its adherence to the same ideologies that Zarqawi promoted. Of all the changes that have been made, from the changing of the title of the organization (many times) to how it interacts with other groups, the greatest of all was made by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the current leader, when he took control of enormous parts of Syria and Iraq. When doing this he established that the group would now be called the Islamic State (IS), and a caliphate was established in which he became the caliph (Byman, 2016). The area that is now controlled by IS has practically turned into a fully functioning state and provides “medical assistance, enforces price controls, creates courts and police forces, prods local municipal employees to return to work, and provides traffic officers,” but none of these services are well run and IS refuses to allow any nongovernment organizations to assist because they want to have full control of the state (Byman, 2016). IS has used these services as tools to train local young boys in the towns that are taken over and to teach the jihadist ideologies in schools.
While IS has been relatively successful in expanding its territory since 2014, they are now beginning to feel the pressure of the United States and Iraqi armies moving in on the IS controlled city of Mosul. In the past month, IS leaders have began to flee the country. “They took their families and their money and left,” says Jebril Shehada Abdullah, a former police officer. “They left only the young guys. They were all locals who were deceived” (Bradley, 2016). This may seem like a victory for the locals who had their city overrun by IS, but the young men who filled the spots of the IS leaders have become intoxicated with power and ride through neighborhoods on motorcycles, yelling and screaming, shooting at anyone who dared step outside their house. Although Mosul is seemingly in shambles, the Iraqi army is nearing the city and stirring fear within the IS leaders. While this is only one part of the IS controlled region, it shows that establishing a centralized base will inevitably lead to the downfall of terrorist organizations. Their power lies in their secrecy and ability to stay in the shadows — something that al-Qaeda has proven to be true since becoming the United States number one target after September 11th.
Beginning with 19 Jihad extremists attacking the United States of America on our home soil, up to the modern day there has been little time in which the U.S. has not had some connection to the Middle East, whether it be supporting governments or having troops on the ground. While the United States’ war on terror has made some progress, our involvement also has created situations that people like Zarqawi could exploit, to spread his extreme Jihad perception of the Islamic faith. The only time we have truly seen IS retreat was extremely recently due to its establishing a set base that was targetable. It is time that the United States considers alternative methods for eradicating terrorist groups. These Muslims are not scared to die for their country, so we must target what they do care about — the growth and spread of their extreme Jihad beliefs. If the United States can find a way to change the extreme Jihad people’s view of the western world, it will be a much more effective war on terror compared to what has been tried over the last fifteen years.
References
Bradley, M. (2016, November 16). A Real-Life Horror Movie Unfolds as ISIS Loses Control in Mosul. Retrieved November 16, 2016, from NBC News website: http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/isis-uncovered/last-days-isis-mosul-real-life-horror-movie-n684601
Byman, D. (2016). Understanding the Islamic State — A Review Essay. International Security, 40(4).
Hatch, R. O. (2005). A year of de-Baathification in post-ponflict Iraq: Time for mid-course corrections and a long-term strategy. Journal of Human Rights, 4(1), 103–112.
Pipes, D. (2003). Militant Islam reaches America. New York: W.W. Norton.
Reed, D. (2006). On Killing al-Zarqawi — Does United States Policy Know its Tools in the War on Terror? Homeland Security Affairs, 2(2).
Terrill, W. A. (2014). Understanding the strengths and vulnerabilities of Isis. Parameters, 44(3), 13–23.
Terrill, W. A. (2016). [Review of the book Black flags: the rise of Isis]. Parameters, 46(2).
