... comparison, Chechnya is nearly ten times smaller than the area controlled by ISIS.
The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria went far beyond the operational scope of its predecessor, Al-Qaeda, establishing control over a large territory in northwestern Iraq and northeastern Syria, and creating proto-state institutions of authority. This reality is especially disturbing for the United States, which is bound by its Middle Eastern network of alliances to deter ISIS, but at the same time suffers from a twelve-year war-weariness and is not ready to conduct a full-scale counter-terrorist operation. Still, even more disturbing is the evidence of how similar the current ...
... revolutions in the Middle East and North Africa, namely the United States, a number of NATO countries and the oil monarchies of the Arabian Peninsula. They are interested in fomenting processes of disintegration in the strategically important region of the Middle East.
All attempts to reach a settlement in Syria and Iraq without the general disarmament of all armed groups and forces are doomed to failure. The militarization of the region and pinpoint air attacks will only strengthen and expand the terrorist International, and contribute to spreading jihad to other ...
Interview with Vitaly Naumkin
The frantic activity of the Islamic State and the growing number supporters of extremist actions are causing alarm and anxiety in the West. The unabated conflict in Syria and fragile internal situation in Iraq are creating fertile ground for a strengthening in the position of the Islamic State. What will the West, particularly the United States, do next? Will the current alliances in the Middle East undergo any changes?
Vitaly Naumkin
, Doctor of History, Professor and RIAC member, Director of the RAS Institute of Oriental Studies, shares his insights on the situation.
Will the fight against the Islamic State reshape the current alliances ...
ISIL or al-Qaeda 2.0?
On June 10, 2014, Iraq was shattered by yet another political earthquake, raising the possibility of another Afghanistan located right in the heart of the Middle East. Within just a very small number of days, the terrorist organization Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL), known in Iraq and Syria for appalling atrocities and militant fanaticism, was able to occupy the two-million person city of Mosul, the second largest in Iraq, and vowed to march victoriously on Baghdad.
As of writing, the ISIL ...
... positions of his friends, and alienate all neutrals while he was gradually winning the war, and at a time when UN chemical inspectors were in Damascus? The sceptic observer cannot help but remember the false intelligence on which the 2003 US invasion of Iraq was founded; Saddam Hussein did not in fact possess weapons of mass destruction. The parallel is inescapable. In May, Carla Del Ponte, leading member of the United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Syria, asserted that there ...
