How The Islamic State Spread In The Middle East

A building smolders after a Syrian airstrike in Damascus in January 2013. (Goran Tomasevic / Reuters)

David Ignatius, Washington Post: How ISIS Spread in the Middle East

And how to stop it

“It is perfectly true, as the philosophers say, that life must be understood backwards. But they forget the other proposition: that it must be lived forwards.” This observation was made in 1843 by the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard in a journal entry, but it might have been written about the contemporary Middle East.

We have been living the Islamic State forwards, surprised at every turn, but we can perhaps begin to understand it backwards. Although ISIS took most of the world by surprise when it swept into the Iraqi city of Mosul in June 2014, the group and its forebears had been proclaiming their goals for a decade. Like many consequential events, this one didn’t sneak up on policymakers; they simply didn’t see what was taking shape in front of them. ISIS told us exactly what it was going to do, and then did it. This was a secret conspiracy hiding in plain sight.

WNU Editor: There are some good points here. I agree with David Ignatius' prediction that what happened in Lebanon with the Taif Agreement in 1989 is probably the best that can be hoped for in Iraq and Syria .... and what happens when the U.S. leaves "power vacuums". And he is correct when he brigs up the following quote from Syrian businessman named Raja Sidawi in 2003 during the U.S. - Iraq invasion ....

.... “I am sorry for America,” Sidawi said. “You are stuck. You have become a country of the Middle East. America will never change Iraq, but Iraq will change America.” …

There is more .... if you a few minutes it is worth the read.