SSB Lecturette series: ISIS - A threat to Humanity : Part 1

                                                             Critical analysis of  ISIS

This is the latest happening and has been in international forum for long so i thought of presenting this topic for the peer aspirants. This can be an important topic for GD or lecturette for the upcoming SSB, so first of all lets see the flow of events that happened under this name:

September 11, 2001 - Taliban destroyed the Two Towers and the Pentagon, killing thousands of innocent who didn't even know why they were killed, leaving children orphaned, widowed husbands , widowed wives, old parents who wouldn't be able to see their son or daughter again. The tragedy left USA and the whole world in the state of Trauma. Security forces were alerted all over the world.

26 – 30 July, 2009 – Boko Haram an Islamist group carried out a massive strike on Maiduguri, Borno, Nigeria. Clashes occurred between the police forces and the militant group. The result? A 100 dead bodies in the police station. Army intervened; roads were filled with blood, roughly 700 died. With time did the violence stopped? Did the group perished? Sadly, No, it had only grown stronger.

12 March, 1993 –The Mumbai bombings, a total of 15 bombs were planted throughout the city. Streets were filled with blood, children, women, old men, innocent anyone, everyone suffered. The blood of innocent flowed throughout the city.

Terrorism has struck mankind again and again. From time to time the blood of the innocent has flown and mankind had done almost nothing to stop it. After the attack on the World Trade Center, America declared war against Taliban and Al Qaeda on October 7, 2001. The war lasted till 2014, Taliban had been bent to its knees, and the world was appreciating US and the other western powers contribution in carrying out such a mission in Afghanistan. The threat and terror of the Taliban regime was seeing an end, a new day and new hope was emerging, Terrorism seemed like something which was controllable.

But with the retrieval of US and other forces from Afghanistan a new evil came into being. This one more deadly, more brutal in its means, more cunning and more influential than any other militant group which ever existed. From its time of emergence The Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (Now known as the Islamic State) has gone stronger and stronger; the trick lies just not in their increasing militant strength but in how the group operates? How it funds itself? How it influences people around the globe? And How it is able to provide itself with weapon systems which only armies are capable of possessing?

Background:

The Islamist Group didn't sprang to life out of the blue, in fact it’s making is related to a number of incidents.

Iraq’s side of the story:

After the Iran Iraq war, Saddam Hussain liquidated a number of top military officers, as he feared being overthrown by them. Saddam also formed special units like the Republican Guards and Fedayeen Saddam; these units were trained for spying works and in explosives. After the US invasion, these forces joined the insurgency against the coalition forces comprising of US, England, Australia and Poland and the new Shiite dominated ruling order. The Shiite order came into existence after Saddam was killed and Nouri –al – Maliki was elected the Prime minister by his own party and since 2006 ran the Shiite Government that systematically excluded the Sunni Iraqi’s from power and gave preference to the Shia population of the country.

Maliki’s policies included:

•    Using Iraq’s counter terrorism laws to imprison Sunni Muslims
•    Exploiting laws that prohibited Saddam era officials  to hold top offices both in Government and Military
•    Using deadly force to break up peaceful Sunni demonstrations against his government
•   Aligning himself with non - government Shia militias that slaughtered Sunnis in the civil war before the invasion.

The terror didn't stop here, Iran along with Maliki made death squads to hunt down the top Military officers of Saddam’s era. After partnering with America the Sunni tribes defeated the Sunni insurgency, but pleadings by American officials to stop the hunting didn’t effect Maliki and Iran a bit. This consistent ill treatment not only convinced Iraqi Sunnis that this government won’t ever listen to them, but also pushed them to believe that making ISIS and other Sunni Militia seemed a better alternative. 

I have divided this topic into two parts so that i does not get boring for the aspirants. In second part of this topic we will see the reality of Syria's side of story and how did this group function, from where they recieve their funding etc. so keep reading!!

Click here to read: ISIS - A threat to Humanity : Part 2

About the Author: Shekhar Tanwar is a computer science engineer who is working with a renowned MNC and is a die heart defense aspirant. Guitar is his passion and he is very firm believer of physical fitness. This article is a way to help defense aspirants to present his critical views on the topic, on the forum so that collective exchange of thoughts can take place.