Outrage at the Islamic State (ISIS) grew again this week with the brutal killing of a second American journalist, Steven Sotloff.
In statement following the killing, President Obama vowed to degrade and destroy the Islamic State. However, the United States still has no clear plan for how to do so.
“The U.S. is responding,” says Joshua Landis, Director of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma and the author of the widely read blog Syria Comment. “The problem is that President Obama does not want to rush into Syria without having local allies. And ISIS presents a problem because it's growing stronger.”
Landis says much of the support for the Islamic State comes from Sunnis who feel trapped between the U.S.-backed Shiite sectarian government in Baghdad and the Russian-backed Shiite sectarian government in Damascus.
“The Sunnis trapped between these two capitals are caught in a vice grip,” Landis says. “ISIS is their champion and is trying to build a state and create national institutions. The other militias have not done that, and consequently the Sunnis living in this big expanse from Damascus right to Baghdad have been living in constant fear, dislocation, and turmoil.”
Over the past several weeks, the United States has provided aerial and tactical support to Iraqi government forces as they have fought to retake areas seized by ISIS. Obama also sent 350 more American troops to Iraq this week.
However, this might not be enough.
“Just bombing is not really an answer for these people,” Landis says. “[ISIS] is providing some kind of security and order. And people are so hungry for that after three years, almost four years now, of turmoil, for the United States to destroy that emerging state, they need to put something else in its place. And that's the challenge for President Obama. Does he want to get into nation building in Syria and how does he do it?”
The fight against the Islamic State is complicated further by the ongoing civil war in Syria, which has caused the partial collapse of the state.
“Recently journalists have come out with a figure of 40,000 opposition troops that are being funded and armed by the United States in Syria who are trying to destroy Assad,” Landis says. “And this creates a problem because as you get a failed state in Damascus and as the Syrian state gets undermined, ISIS is profiting from this. So in a sense, by destroying Assad, we are helping ISIS.”
The United States must determine its regional priorities and partners before it can act effectively Landis says.
“Who do we want to partner with and how do we do it? We don't have an answer for that,” Landis says. “And that's what the President said so clearly the other day – we don’t really have a strategy yet. We're working on one. And, boy, he needs to develop one.”
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