Well this certainly derailed in a hurry, its sometimes funny how message boards reflect real life and real realities on a micro scale.
The more I think about the strategy the more I think that its being over sold. This is truly not about destroying ISIS, it will never happen without and effective force on the ground to go in and clean ISIS out of the area.
The old saying is that bombers are cool but they don't hold territory.
This is plain and simply about holding ISIS and containing them, but this is a far more complex issue that's going to need a combined strategy.
You have to kill the leaders. I've always said that the strategy to removing a terrorist group is to murder leaders, and then murder the next leaders, and keep killing them until the leadership is composed of a combination of inexperience, those who aren't ready or respected enough to lead, and those who don't want to die. Then you can start capitalizing on mistakes.
You do have to have feet on the ground, and if its a insurgency group you have to decide who you want to get into bed with. Right now the common perception is that the Kurds are going to do the hard fighting and call in air strikes. I question the effectiveness of the strategy and the command and control process here. The Kurds aren't going to be discriminant in terms of calling in bomb strikes.
There needs to be a bigger push on punishing nations that are supporting ISIL. I'm not talking militarily, but economically. And in the case if its "private citizens" in any one nation that are supporting a group like ISIL, then you have to encourage your friends "To take those networks apart" to stay in your good graces.
Domestic intelligence operations has to increase. We know that there are recruiting pipelines in most western countries. The frightening aspect is that not everyone is going over and I firmly believe that cells are being left here to fund raise and to eventually do something devastating, see Australia. I also believe that the government and the police have to come down on these radicalizing centers and the individuals running them.
International intelligence. I firmly believe that wire taps, and satellite evesdropping and electronic intelligence are something that is being over hyped and relied on way too much. The various intelligence organizations need to increase their operating tempos in not only Isil held territories, but within these other radical groups.
I have this horrible feeling that ISIL is seeing this strategy for what it is, a fairly soft strategy by a world that's not willing to push really hard and is in a way afraid to engage. This strategy might actually encourage ISIL and not demoralize them.
Just my two cents.
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