– U.S/NATO STRATEGY AGAINST ISIS

 

 

Following NATO summit in Cardiff, Wales, ended on 09/05/2014, and initially summoned to discuss the Ukrainian crisis, USA President Barack Obama and UK PM David Cameron with other senior European leaders agreed on a strategy to fight I.S.I.S in Iraq, Syria and the Middle East.  They formed a basic coalition of 10 NATO countries members: USA, Great Britain, Germany, France, Australia, Canada, Denmark. Italy and Poland. The  role of the tenth country – Turkey, an Islamic state which continuously facilitated the passage of thousands Islamists volunteers, over 4,000 of them from Western Democracies to Syria and Iraq, is ambiguous and mostly symbolic. 

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In an interview to NBCnews, Meet the Press, on Sunday 09/07/2014, President Obama detailed the strategy.  “I think, for the, perhaps the first time, you have absolute clarity that the problem for Sunni states in the region, many of whom are our allies, is not simply Iran. It’s not simply a Sunni-Shia issue” he said prioritising the problems in the region in his point of view.   

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*A. To stabilize the political situation in Iraq  and to put a representative new government in place in Iraq. 

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*B. To support local forces fighting on the ground against I.S.I.S, not necessarily national armies but local militias: the Kurdish ‘Peshmerga’, the free Syrian Army – FSA, Shiite militias, Sunni Tribes who once fought with USA against Al Qaeda in Iraq, known as the “Awakening Councils” and were abandoned by US after the withdrawal from Iraq (see – IRAQ’S 2010 Deal) and, eventually, the Iraqi Army too.  To support these groups with weapon and money. 

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*C. To provide tactical air support to all the forces fighting I.S.I.S on the ground, especially in Iraq. 

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*D. To conduct an air campaign to dismantle I.S.I.S from its capacities, to kill its leadership  and to  minimise the territories held by I.S.I.S (see – I.S Command). 

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*E. to form an alliance or co-partners  of moderate Arab Sunni states, such as Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates – UAE . 

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*F. No American troops on the ground in direct combat missions in the region.  

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Although President Obama described the future threat of I.S.I.S Islamists veterans using American, European and Western documentation and passports to move freely between the Western Democracies in order to carry out a mega-terror attack he did not mention specifically a comprehensive worldwide intelligence and security efforts to track the potential terrorists down and the legal measures that will be used against them when and if they will come back home.  The American strategy suffers from built-in problems.  

 

*A. The European countries don’t want to fight . some of them because of the strong Muslim communities in their own states. 

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*B. The moderate Sunni countries feel strong mistrust to America and a sense they were, just recently during the Obama administration, betrayed by America. They also face a strong Islamic opposition that can destabilized even more the region. 

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*C. The American virtual partners in the Middle East are, at the same time, bitter enemies like Saudi Arabia and Iran or Turkey and the Kurds for example.

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*D. Some of the alleged potential partners are supporting their own client terror group. Qatar financed Jabhat al-Nusra in Syria, Saudi tycoons provided money to I.S.I.S up to recently etc’.

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 * Related topics:

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12/2011 – IRAQI  CONCERN
09/2012 – US ENVOY CHRIS STEVENS KILLED IN BENGHAZI, LIBYA
06/2013 – AL QAEDA’S DISPUTE
08/2013 – THREAT ON U.S CONTINGENTS IN THE MUSLIM WORLD
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* Read more ;
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GOV.U.K-.NATO SUMMIT