Antichrist Raises Mahdi Army (Revelation 13:16)

Antichrist Raises Mahdi Army

Matthew Cox, Military.com

Muqtada al-Ṣadr and his Shia militia engaged in ferocious fighting with American forces during the Iraq War. Now, the Shiite strong man is back in the spotlight and threatening to escalate tensions between the Sunni and Shia populations as Iraq struggles to thwart an insurgency of Sunni fighters, experts say.

Militants of the Islamic State in Iraq and Levant have spilled over the Syrian border into Iraq and captured several northern and western cities — along with the attention of the rest of the world — and now threaten to topple Baghdad.

The Iraqi Army remains in disarray, awaiting assistance from the U.S. in the form of military advisors. About 90 special operations troops have arrived in Baghdad, where they will join some 40 others attached to the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad to establish assessment teams and a joint operations center with Iraqi forces, Pentagon Press Secretary Navy Rear Adm. John Kirby said June 24.

They are the first of what could be up to 300 U.S. military advisors President Barack Obama has ordered to the country to assess the cohesiveness of Iraqi security forces and the threat posed by advancing ISIL insurgents.

Meanwhile, thousands of Iraqi Shia militiamen are vowing to oppose the advance of ISIL forces, also known as Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. And now that Sadr has come back in the public eye, many fear the resurgence of his followers known as the Mahdi army.

At its strongest, Sadr’s Mahdi army once numbered about 60,000 fighters that fought American forces in cities such as Baghdad and Najaf.

“They were a potent force,” Colin Kahl, senior fellow and director of Middle East Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, told reporters at a June 25 round-table discussion. “They opposed the United States occupation of Iraq.”

Some of the fiercest fighting with the Mahdi army occurred in Najaf and involved units from the Marine Corps‘ 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit and the U.S. Army’s 1st Armored, 1st Infantry and 1st Cavalry Divisions in 2004. Fighting with Sadr’s forces broke out again in Najaf in 2007 and involved the elements from the Army’s 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team and the 2nd Infantry Division.

Sadr’s entrance into the current Sunni-Shia conflict could have the effect of tossing a lighted match into a pool of gasoline, experts maintain.

“I think we are in a race against time here,” Kahl said. “The momentum of ISIS will be reversed by Iraqi security forces and U.S. advisors or Shia politicians like Sadr will take matters into their own hands and unleash their followers to engage in the nasty business of rolling back ISIS fighters, which could involve a lot of sectarian cleansing and other things that were quite terrible in the 2006-2007 period.”

This article originally appeared at Military.com. Copyright 2014.

Antichrist Will Shake The Earth (Revelation 6)

POWERFUL Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr has vowed to “shake the ground” under the feet of advancing Sunni militants as Iraqi premier Nuri al-Maliki warned rivals against exploiting the crisis to sideline him.

Antichrist Shakes the Earth

Mr Sadr, whose movement long battled US forces during Washington’s nearly nine-year war in Iraq, also voiced opposition to American military advisers meeting with Iraqi commanders combating an offensive that has overrun swathes of five provinces, killed nearly 1100 people, displaced hundreds of thousands and threatens to tear the country apart.

His remarks came as security forces continued to repel assaults on critical towns and infrastructure, though fighters from al-Qa’ida’s Syrian franchise made a local alliance with the jihadist group leading the charge in Iraq, bolstering its offensive.

“We will shake the ground under the feet of ignorance and extremism,” Mr Sadr said in a televised speech from the Shiite holy city of Najaf.

He added that he only backed “providing international support from non-occupying states for the army of Iraq”.

The cleric’s remarks came days after fighters loyal to him paraded with weapons in the Sadr City area of north Baghdad, vowing to fight a major militant offensive that has alarmed the world and threatens to tear Iraq apart.

Iraq’s flagging security forces were swept aside by the initial offensive but have since at least somewhat recovered, and while Mr Sadr’s Mahdi Army militia remains officially inactive, fighters loyal to the cleric have nevertheless vowed to combat the militant advance.

The cleric also called for “new faces” in a national unity government following April 30 elections that saw incumbent prime minister Nouri al-Maliki emerge with by far the most seats, albeit short of a majority.

In apparent response to calls from Sunni tribal leaders to form a government that ignores the result of an April 30 election, which they describe as a sham, Mr Maliki said on Wednesday that would be a “coup against the constitution and the political process”.

The beleaguered premier, whose bloc won by far the most seats in April, said such a move was “an attempt by those who are against the constitution to eliminate the young democratic process and steal the votes of the voters.” Though Washington has pressed for Iraq’s fractious political leaders to unite in the face of the campaign led by the Islamic State of Iraq and al Sham (ISIS) jihadist group, they have shown little sign of coming together.

US “support will be intense, sustained, and if Iraq’s leaders take the necessary steps to bring the country together, it will be effective,” Secretary of State John Kerry said during a visit to Iraq in which he met numerous politicians and urged them to work together.

US President Barack Obama has so far refrained from carrying out air strikes on the insurgents, as urged by Mr Maliki, but American military advisers began meeting Iraqi commanders yesterday, with Washington having offered up to 300.

Washington has stopped short of calling for Mr Maliki to go, but has left little doubt it feels he has squandered the opportunity to rebuild Iraq since American troops withdrew in 2011.

In a sign the Iraqi military has performed better in recent days, loyalists fought off insurgent attacks on Wednesday on a major air base and a key western town, after repelling assaults on Iraq’s biggest oil refinery.

Militants and security forces clashed periodically overnight, but government troops maintained control of the Balad air base, while another offensive was repelled in Haditha in Anbar province, west of Baghdad.

But the country was nevertheless hit by militant violence, with bombings and shelling south of Baghdad and in the disputed, ethnically mixed northern oil hub of Kirkuk killing 20 people.

Mr Maliki’s security spokesman has meanwhile said hundreds of soldiers have been killed since the offensive began.

Insurgents were also bolstered by fighters when Al-Nusra Front, al-Qa’ida’s front group in Syria, made a local pledge of loyalty to ISIS on a town along the Syria-Iraq border, giving it control over both sides of the frontier.

The move reflects how ISIS is fast gaining the upper hand in eastern Syria, where it has been locked in combat with fighters from the al-Qa’ida franchise and its allies virtually all year.

ISIS adheres to a harsh interpretation of Islamic law and considers Iraq’s majority Shiite population to be heretics.

It aims to create an Islamic state straddling Iraq and Syria, where it has become a major force in the rebellion against President Bashar al-Assad.

It has commandeered an enormous quantity of cash and resources during the advance, boosting its coffers.

The United Nations says at least 1075 people have been killed in Iraq between June 5 and 22 and has tripled its appeal for aid funding to more than $312 million, while the UN food agency has warned that the country faces “serious food security concerns”.

AFP

Iranian Drones Courtesy of the US

Iran Secretly Sending Drones and Supplies Into Iraq, U.S. Officials Say

Iranian Drones Courtesy of the US

MICHAEL R. GORDON

BRUSSELS — Iran is directing surveillance drones over Iraq from an airfield in Baghdad and is secretly supplying Iraq with tons of military equipment, supplies and other assistance, American officials said. Tehran has also deployed an intelligence unit there to intercept communications, the officials said.

The secret Iranian programs are part of a broader effort by Tehran to gather intelligence and help Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki’s government in its struggle against Sunni militants with the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria.

Gen. Qassim Suleimani, the head of Iran’s paramilitary Quds Force, has visited Iraq at least twice to help Iraqi military advisers plot strategy. And Iran has deployed about a dozen other Quds Force officers to advise Iraqi commanders, and help mobilize more than 2,000 Shiite militiamen from southern Iraq, American officials said

Iranian transport planes have also been making two daily flights of military equipment and supplies to Baghdad — 70 tons per flight — for Iraqi security forces.

“It’s a substantial amount,” said an American official, who declined to be identified because he was discussing classified reports. “It’s not necessarily heavy weaponry but it’s not just light arms and ammunition.”

The Iranian moves come as the United States is deploying the first of as many as 300 military advisers to assist Iraqi forces and to try to stabilize the deteriorating security situation in Iraq.

The American and Iranian military moves are not coordinated, American officials said. Even though the United States and Iran both oppose the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, known as ISIS, they are still competing for influence in Iraq and are backing opposing sides in the civil war in Syria.

“The Iranians are playing in a big way in Iraq,” Senator Saxby Chambliss of Georgia, the ranking Republican on the Intelligence Committee, said in an interview.

The security crisis in Iraq was one of the topics in Secretary of State John Kerry’s meetings with allied officials who have gathered here for a meeting of NATO foreign ministers to discuss Ukraine and other issues. On Tuesday night, Mr. Kerry reviewed a number of pressing issues with Catherine Ashton, the foreign policy chief for the European Union, including Ukraine and “the grave security situation on the ground in Iraq,” Jen Psaki, the State Department spokeswoman, said in a statement.
The Obama administration has sought to open a dialogue with Iran on the Iraq crisis. William J. Burns, the deputy secretary of State, met briefly last week with an Iranian diplomat at the margins of negotiations in Vienna over Iran’s nuclear program.

But Western officials say there appear to be divisions between the Iranian Foreign Ministry, which may be open to some degree of cooperation, and General Suleimani, who was the mastermind of Iran’s strategy in Iraq when, American officials say, Iraqi Shiite militias trained by Iran attacked American troops there with powerful explosive devices supplied by Tehran. The general is also the current architect of Iranian military support in Syria for President Bashar al-Assad.

The security crisis in Iraq was one of the topics in Secretary of State John Kerry’s meetings with allied officials who have gathered here for a meeting of NATO foreign ministers to discuss Ukraine and other issues. On Tuesday night, Mr. Kerry reviewed a number of pressing issues with Catherine Ashton, the foreign policy chief for the European Union, including Ukraine and “the grave security situation on the ground in Iraq,” Jen Psaki, the State Department spokeswoman, said in a statement.

The Obama administration has sought to open a dialogue with Iran on the Iraq crisis. William J. Burns, the deputy secretary of State, met briefly last week with an Iranian diplomat at the margins of negotiations in Vienna over Iran’s nuclear program.

But Western officials say there appear to be divisions between the Iranian Foreign Ministry, which may be open to some degree of cooperation, and General Suleimani, who was the mastermind of Iran’s strategy in Iraq when, American officials say, Iraqi Shiite militias trained by Iran attacked American troops there with powerful explosive devices supplied by Tehran. The general is also the current architect of Iranian military support in Syria for President Bashar al-Assad.

Beast Of Sea Finally Correct: Nuclear Attack Will Happen On US Soil

Dick Cheney: U.S. Will Suffer ‘Far Deadlier Attack’ Within Next Decade

Beast of Sea – Dick Cheney

 

The Huffington Post  | By Igor Bobic

Former Vice President Dick Cheney offered an extremely morose prediction about the country’s future on Tuesday.

Asked on the Hugh Hewitt radio show whether he believes the United States could survive the decade without another attack on the homeland, Cheney said, “I doubt it.”

“I think there will be another attack and next time, I think it’s likely to be far deadlier than the last one,” he added. “Imagine what would happen if somebody could smuggle a nuclear device, put it in a shipping container and drive it down the Beltway outside Washington D.C.”

“If that were to happen, do you see the government reconstituting? Because it would have to be military rule for a period of time at least,” Hewitt said.

Cheney described his role creating a national security directive in the aftermath of terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, so that federal agencies would be able to continue performing essential functions under various circumstances.

“It was very, very important and we operated and actually trained under circumstances of how we would go about providing for a government to survive if we’re having nuclear weapons from the Soviet Union falling all over the country,” he said.

The former vice president also made news recently for accusing President Barack Obama of abandoning Iraq to Islamic militants. In a Wall Street Journal column he wrote with his daughter, Liz, Cheney proclaimed — perhaps with a lack of self-awareness — “Rarely has a U.S. president been so wrong about so much at the expense of so many.”

Mahdi Taking Over (Revelation 13:16)

WITH IRAQI MILITARY FACING COLLAPSE, SHIA FIGHTERS BEGIN TO FILL VOID

ISIS Terrorists

by FRANCES MARTEL 23 Jun 2014 59POST A COMMENT

As the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) jihadist group tears through towns abandoned by the Iraqi military, reports warn the government’s forces are close to total collapse. In light of this failure, Shia fighters loyal to cleric Muqtada al-Sadr await orders to take on ISIS directly.

The Washington Post reports this week that the mission to rehabilitate the Iraqi army is a difficult one, as 300 U.S. troops sent by the Obama administration arrive to fulfill an advisory role to the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. Tens of thousands of Iraqi troops are believed to have deserted, while most who remained in what are now ISIS-controlled territories were killed in mass executions, leaving the army in what one official describes to the paper anonymously as “psychological collapse.”

The troops that have been killed or deserted have been replaced by volunteers that thePost notes have only had days of training in some instances, with little if any experience in real-world combat. In contrast, the ISIS jihadists they will face have, in many instances, spent years fighting in the Syrian civil war and are now being imported into Iraq to do the same.

In addition to losing soldiers, the Iraqi army has been left with significantly fewer leaders in power. Prime Minister Maliki fired a number of high-level military officials last week in response to the mass desertion that allowed ISIS to take over major cities like Mosul and plunder their banks, military arsenals, and civilian resources.

The absence of the Iraqi military has allowed for other paramilitary groups to fill the void. Pivotal to the safety of Baghdad has been the Kurdish Peshmerga force, which has controlled the main roads to Baghdad and refused to allow passage to the capital for ISIS forces. They may soon be joined by a significant force of Shi’ite fighters loyal to cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who has called for Iraqis to fight ISIS and the Sunni jihadist threat.

In Baghdad, a force of tens of thousands staged a parade to rally Shi’ites against ISIS, displaying their weaponry and declaring loudly their intention to keep ISIS away from the capital. Those marching in the parade chanted for cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to approve of their plans to enter battle with ISIS. The Mahdi militia, while an enemy of ISIS, also previously attacked American soldiers while the U.S. maintained troops in the country.

Al-Sadr, while preaching strongly against ISIS, has made clear he does not want the United States involved in retaking the nation from the Sunni group. Clerics loyal to al-Sadrhave warned that the Mahdi army will turn on America if they enter the nation to fight ISIS, while al-Sadr himself has called for Shi’ites to defend holy sites in danger of destruction from ISIS attack. The introduction of Shi’ite Mahdi forces to a conflict involving Kurdish troops, Iran, Syria, and potentially the United States could only escalate the violence, leaving little room for the United States to operate and ease tensions.

They Take The Mark of the Beast (Revelation 13:16)

Anti-U.S. Cleric Muqtada al-Sadr Retakes Stage Amid Iraq Turmoil

By Cassandra Vinograd

They Take The Mark of the Beast

 

 AHMAD AL-RUBAYE / AFP – Getty Images

Shiite fighters parade with their weapons in Baghdad, Iraq, on Saturday.

The endless lines of men with fists raised in the air and armed with machine guns and rocket launchers rallied in Iraq’s streets to send a warning of military might to the Sunni extremist fighters tearing through their country.

But the thousands of Shiite fighters – some sporting suicide vests and calling themselves the “Peace Brigades” – also sent another signal: feared firebrand cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army are back.

While Sadr was once the poster boy for violent resistance to the U.S.-led invasion, he has in recent years positioned himself as a political kingmaker in post-withdrawal Iraq and even publicly discouraged sectarian strife.

But analysts say that his recent calls for brigades to form and protect holy shrines from attacks by Sunni militants – which culminated in the weekend’s show of force – betray a canny commandant and risk returning Iraq to some of its darkest days.

“The forces that he puts on the streets are some of the worst sectarian killers in Iraq”

“It means two things – that Iraqi security forces are incapable of providing security in Baghdad and the chance of the re-emergence of sectarian slaughter – with death squads roaming Baghdad and other areas around the capital – increases dramatically,” said Bill Roggio, editor of The Long War Journal.

Roggio – like many – question Sadr’s attempts to play a moderate card.

“He speaks a good game but watch what Sadr does, not what he says. That’s been the real problem with him all along,” he added. “He may speak a good game, but the forces that he puts on the streets are some of the worst sectarian killers in Iraq.”

Sadr formed the Mahdi Army in 2003 after the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime. The Shiite militia gained broader notoriety when it waged fierce battles in Najaf against U.S. forces a year later. It is blamed for the mass killings of Sunni civilians in sectarian violence in Iraq that peaked in 2006 and 2007 and for cleansing Sunnis from Baghdad neighborhoods.

The Pentagon once said the Mahdi Army had “replaced al Qaeda in Iraq as the most dangerous accelerant of potentially self-sustaining sectarian violence.”

When Sadr ordered a ceasefire in 2007, the move was accompanied by questions over whether he sought to wait out U.S. forces or to make a political play.

Sadr helped usher Iraq’s Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to power in 2006 and ultimately again in 2010 – but since then has become one of the premier’s most vocal critics, describing him as a dictator.

In February, Sadr said he was withdrawing from all politics and unaffiliated with any faction. His explanation: a necessary decision to protect the family name.

The puzzling move – accompanied by fierce criticism of Maliki’s government – prompted rampant speculation that the cleric was repositioning himself – or reinventing his brigade – rather than retiring.

Few “really bought it” when Sadr said in Feburary he was stepping away from politics, according to independent Iraq analyst Stephen Wicken,

“He’s much more canny than that,” Wicken said. “He plays this reluctant hero card: that he doesn’t want to be dragged into politics and public life but then has to by force of his belief or weight of his family’s legacy.”

Those guesses appeared to play out when Sadr recently called for brigades to form and protect Shiite shrines from the lightning advance and offensive by Sunni extremist fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS).

The heavily armed fighters who answered his call marched through Iraq’s cities over the weekend under the name “Saraya Al Salaam” – or Peace Brigades – but to analysts and Iraq watchers, they are the officially inactive Mahdi Army – rebranded.

Sadr’s ability to call out massive numbers of supporters at a moment’s notice has been one of the cleric’s “hallmarks” over the years, according to Wicken. In this case, calling up fighters in the name of protecting Shiite interests could present a dig at Maliki, whose forces have been unable to stave of the ISIS advance. “This is an opportunity for Sadr,” Wicken said.

“If the state needs to rely on thugs like Sadr and others to secure areas that are being threatened by ISIS … then it is really in trouble”

While Sadr’s ultimate ambition might be to achieve the spiritual authority of his forebears – both his father and father-in-law were Grand Ayatollahs – “he doesn’t actually have the personality” or gravitas to become a religious authority, according to Wicken.

Sadr’s timing is everything, according to analysts, who point to the cleric’s tendency to step away from day-to-day politics and return when opportunity is ripe to reclaim the mantle of Shiite defender.

“He’s not a serious cleric, he’s not a religious authority. The only power and legitimacy that he actually has comes primarily from his family’s name and legacy and also from his willingness to take really populist platforms and, when necessary, call out his forces to kill people,” Wicken said

Sadr’s real credentials stem from his role in founding and commanding the Mahdi Army. While he has lost some ground to splinter groups in the past few years, “he still has that resonance,” Wicken said. While Sadr is not a “gifted orator, his words carry weight,” according to Wicken.

Putting fighters on the streets would signal to Sadr’s Shiite rivals that “he’s still relevant,” according to Hayder al-Khoei, an Iraq analyst for London-based think tank Chatham House.

“He’s played his hand now,” al-Khoei said. “He’s back and he’s back for good.”

Rebranding the militia as the Peace Brigades reflects a broader attempt to put distance between atrocities commited by Sadr’s fighters against Sunnis in 2006 and 2007.

“They’re trying to shed that black history that they have,” al-Khoei added. “Lots of Sunni Iraqis remember the role they played.”

The mobilization of Sadr’s militia adds to the polarization and portrayal of Iraq’s current crisis as a Shiite-Sunni conflict, analysts say.

Still, the cleric’s battle-hardened and ideologically driven fighters could be an asset to Iraq’s security forces if they are deployed for operations.

“They can add experience in the counterinsurgency campaign – experience that the Iraqi army is desperate for,” al-Khoei said.

While “Sadr has always been more than willing to use force to get what he wants in Iraq,” Roggio said the cleric’s recent re-entry also underscores a deeper point.

“Its further evidence of the deterioration of the state,” Roggio said. “If the state needs to rely on thugs like Sadr and others to secure areas that are being threatened by ISIS and regain control of areas outside of Baghdad, then it is really in trouble. Once the sectarian groups like the Mahdi Army reach the streets, it just greatly increases the chances of the sectarian killing that brought Iraq to the brink of full-scale civil war.”

The Gates of Hell Have Been Opened (Revelation 13)

The gates of hell
By Munir Akram

Antichrist Prepares to Take Over Iraq

AS the US was about to launch its 2003 military invasion of Iraq, the then secretary general of the Arab League, Amr Moussa, warned presciently: “You will open the Gates of Hell”.

Carved out from the debris of the Ottoman Empire by the secret Sykes-Picot pact, Iraq was a Humpty Dumpty state , ruled by a Sunni minority with an oppressed Shia majority and a disaffected Kurdish minority.

To ward off the war and prevent Iraq’s disintegration, Saudi Arabia floated a proposal at the eleventh hour that would have sent Saddam Hussein into exile and passed power to an Iraqi general who would cooperate to assure that Iraq did not possess weapons of mass destruction. Pakistan, then a member of the Security Council, offered to sponsor this proposal. However, it was summarily dismissed in Washington.

Undeterred by friendly warnings, the Americans, soon after occupying Baghdad, proceeded to disband the Iraqi army and ban the Baath Party, the only organised institutions in Iraq. Six months into the invasion, they decided to hold elections. The theory propounded by the ‘neo-conservatives’ in the Bush administration was that democracy could be inducted in authoritarian Arab states, by force if necessary. When the view was expressed that the elections in Iraq would lead to a pro-Iranian Shia government, it was countered by the bizarre thesis that the US aimed to create a rival Shia centre to Iran in Iraq, notwithstanding the deep ties of each of the three Iraqi Shia political parties to Tehran.

As feared, the consequences of American hubris were Iraq’s political disintegration and a Hobbesian ‘war of all against all’. The Kurds, already separated during the years of sanctions against Saddam, consolidated their de facto statelet. The ousted Baathists and army veterans joined the Sunni resistance. Shia parties vied for power, often violently, like Muqtada al-Sadr, against the foreign forces, the Sunnis and often each other. Sunni extremists, including Al Qaeda and Zarqawi, emerged as important actors in fighting the foreign forces and the Shia factions. The Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) was born during this Sunni resistance. It worked with Al Qaeda but was separate from it, focused on local rather than global ‘jihad’.

The US 2006 troop surge, counterterrorism operations, co-option of Sunni tribes and formation of a broad-based coalition in Baghdad restored a semblance of order to be preserved by a new US-trained and equipped Iraqi army.

Then in 2011, the US withdrew totally from Iraq. Nouri al-Maliki, the Shia prime minister, refused to sign a status of forces agreement immunising US forces from Iraqi jurisdiction. President Obama felt obliged to fulfil his promise to end America’s war in Iraq.

With the American departure, Maliki proceeded to transform Iraq into a Shia state, excluding and persecuting Sunni politicians and tribes and further alienating the Kurds. The escalating terrorist attacks against Shia targets over the last two years signalled the resumption of Iraq’s civil war.

The opportunity for the revival of Sunni resistance came not in Iraq but Syria. As the West encouraged opposition to Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite (a Shia sect) regime, the ‘moderate’ Sunni resistance provided a legitimate cover for more ‘radical’ groups: the Nusra Front, linked to Al Qaeda, and specially ISIS, to carve out a leading role for themselves in the Syrian struggle. Al Qaeda broke with ISIS not because it was too ‘radical’ but because it was more effective.

ISIS had a clear military and political strategy: to secure sources of finance and recruits and capture and hold territory in Sunni-majority areas across Syria and Iraq. It displayed tactical flexibility: shifting its attacks to the most vulnerable targets. It has controlled Fallujah for several months. Its takeover of Mosul and march towards Baghdad were well-executed. Surprisingly, the Iraqi army collapsed under the ISIS onslaught.

Mobilised by fear and humiliation and Ayatollah Sistani’s call to arms, the Iraqi army and Shia militias are likely to succeed in defending Baghdad and pushing ISIS out of some mixed Sunni-Shia towns. Retaking Sunni strongholds, like Fallujah and Mosul, may prove more difficult.

America’s ‘hawks’ are pressing the administration to launch air strikes against ISIS, if needed, in tandem with Iran. Admission of their past strategic mistakes or remorse for the massive suffering these have inflicted on the Iraqi people is not in their DNA. Obama has been wise to deflect their pressure, hold back from air strikes and keep his options open.

Unless Maliki reaches a rapid accommodation with the Sunnis and other political forces, which is unlikely, US air strikes would reinforce the Sunni alienation and Iraq’s political division. If American strikes were conducted now in coordination with Iran, they would heighten the suspicions of America’s Gulf allies that it is indeed tilting strategically towards Tehran. Attacking ISIS would willy-nilly also strengthen the ability of the regime in Syria to extend its military advantage over the ‘moderate’ opposition once its main combatant (ISIS) is militarily diminished.

In any case, unlike Al Qaeda, ISIS does not pose an immediate threat to the US ‘homeland’. Its objectives are regional. Bombing it could change its agenda and create the very threat that some in Washington presume it poses. Its eventual neutralisation will have to be achieved by a combination of political and military means.

However, the threat posed by the ISIS advance may generate the political will in Baghdad and, more importantly, in Tehran, to work for a political solution which accommodates the legitimate aspirations of Iraq’s Sunnis within a federal structure.

It appears from Obama’s remarks that Washington intends to evolve its response in consultation with Saudi Arabia and other allies. It will require adroit diplomacy to cut through the deep layers of hostility to achieve a consensus between them and Iran on a peace strategy for Iraq. If this can be achieved, it could lead to a wider understanding on ways to neutralise ISIS and other Sunni and Shia extremists in Iraq, promote a similar ‘federal’ solution to the Syrian conflict, end the region’s sectarian wars and close ‘the gates of hell’.

The writer is a former Pakistan ambassador to the UN.
Published in Dawn, June 22nd, 2014