Fighting ISIS Means Galvanizing Its Resistance

The U.S. campaign against the self-proclaimed Islamic State (also called ISIS) is unlikely to succeed without a clear strategy for taking the fight to ISIS in eastern Syria by convincing local tribal leaders there to join the battle. The experience of fighting ISIS’ predecessor—al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI)—in Anbar province from 2006 to 2008 makes that clear. Defeating AQI would not have been possible without the Sunni Awakening in AQI’s core areas.

ISIS’ continued control over territory from Aleppo to the Syrian-Iraqi border allows the group to resupply and reinforce its frontlines from northern Syria all the way to Baghdad’s suburbs. The area is also a valuable staging and training ground for hordes of foreign ISIS recruits. Indeed, over the long term, ISIS’ rule in eastern Syria is likely to turn the territory into a terrorists’ safe haven, providing cover for transnational jihadist fighters on a scale greater than in Afghanistan during Taliban rule or today in Yemen’s Hadramawt region, where al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsulastill dominates. 

The most recent initiative in the fight—the roughly 96-mile-long, 28-mile-wide U.S.-Turkish ISIS-free zone along the Turkish-Syrian border proposed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and seconded by the United States—could be a step in the right direction. It will certainly help contain ISIS and make it difficult for new foreign fighters to arrive via the Turkish border, but the zone alone is not enough to displace and replace ISIS rule all the way down the Syrian Euphrates River valley. That will take an outright revolution: a Syrian sahwa (awakening) that is supported by the Western coalition.

A LONG WAY TO GO

In spite of the coalition’s efforts to date, ISIS is still a long way from being defeated. To be sure, there have been successes: coalition aircraft have blasted ISIS targets in Deir ez-Zor, al-Hasakah, and the Raqqa provinces of Syria, hitting manned ISIS checkpoints, weapons depots, convoys, and oil facilities. The campaign has put significant pressure on the ISIS leadership. Further, a May 2015 U.S. Special Forces raid in Deir ez-Zor killed an important ISIS logistician and ground commander, Abu Sayyaf. The mission also reaped a significant amount of valuable operational intelligence and was a strong blow to ISIS in eastern Syria. Yet intense as the coalition’s pressure on ISIS has been, there has been one thing missing: a Syrian-led ground operation to take advantage of the gains made by coalition air attacks.

Left alone, any space in Syria that the U.S.-led coalition opens up is likely to soon become filled with a motley coalition of formerly Islamist Syrian rebel factionspredominantly from northwestern Syria’s Aleppo province: groups that have had enough trouble fighting the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, much less taking on ISIS in its core areas. These groups are less motivated to fight ISIS far from their homes than they are to combat the clear and present danger of the Assad regime. This means that the coalition will have to cultivate partners from the ISIS-controlled areas, particularly the tribes of eastern Syria’s Raqqa, al-Hasakah, and Deir ez-Zor provinces. 

But finding local partners will be easier said than done. One reason is ISIS’ brutal suppression of dissent. One potentially promising local ally, the al-Shaytat tribe from the Syrian-Iraqi border area of Abu Kamal in Deir ez-Zor, lost 700 tribesmen when the tribe sought to break away from the nascent caliphate because of grievances about control over local oil wells, the right of tribesmen to bear arms, and a general sociopolitical animosity toward ISIS’ rule. Coalition support for this and other local groups, such as the anti-ISIS insurgent organization al Kafn al Abyad (White Shroud), has been lacking, leaving them with the choice to stand alone and risk horrific consequences, turn to the remnants of the Assad regime for protection, or give in to ISIS.

ISIS has been so careful to exterminate rivals because it saw what the “Sunni Awakening” did to al Qaeda. At the same time, it has also sought to keep populations in line through a calibrated combination of social welfare, public service, and salaried employment. In doing so, the group has embraced the Iraqi Baath-inspired security apparatus, ideological proselytism, and an ever-present threat of violence against its internal enemies. Aware of the need to secure the long-term support of the local community, ISIS courts eastern Syrian Sunni Arab tribal leaders, provides employment and social order for local residents, and militarizes local youth through its Ashbal al-Khilafa (Cubs of the Caliphate) program.