The Islamic State group is weakened but a resurgence is possible if the United States leaves Iraq, US Major General Alexus Grynkewich, the number two commander for the international anti-jihadist coalition in Iraq and Syria, said Wednesday.
The group “certainly still remain a threat,” he said. “They have the potential to resurge if we take pressure off of them for too long.”
On 27 October, 2019, US President Trump announced that the US had killed ISIS leader Abu Bakr Baghdadi, in a televised address at the White House saying that “world’s number one terrorist leader is dead.”
However it is pertinent to note that in 2019, less than five months after Trump declared that ISIS had been 100% defeated, the US Pentagon released a report saying the ISIS is “re-surging” in Syria.
A Pentagon report says ISIS is “re-surging in Syria” https://t.co/3C77Z6IInj pic.twitter.com/krszg3loDU
— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) August 6, 2019
The General said that although he does not see the threat of an immediate ISIS comeback, ” the more time we take pressure off of them, the more of that threat will continue to grow.”
Islamic State resurgence possible if America leaves Iraq: US General https://t.co/96uoTxzj6L @wionews
— jojo (@Santosh9722) January 23, 2020
At a Pentagon press conference, he said the structural weakness of IS is shown by their failure to take advantage of demonstrations in Iraq calling for political reforms since October.
More than 460 protesters have been killed, and demonstrators are angry that few Iraqi security personnel have been charged for the violence.
The allies at the heart of the international coalition have over the last few months been evaluating the position of the jihadist movement whose self-declared “caliphate” once spanned parts of Iraq and Syria. It collapsed last March after years of battle with coalition-backed forces.
IS went underground and reverted to well-honed guerrilla tactics that continued to do damage.
The coalition wanted to determine whether the group is “executing some sort of strategic patience, waiting for an opportunity that they can exploit, or are they truly on the ropes a bit more and lacking in capability and capacity?” Grynkewich said.
He said the Iraqi protests helped the coalition to refine its assessment “that it’s actually ISIS is a little bit more on the lack of capability and capacity side, than strategically patient,” using another acronym for the jihadists.
Tensions between Washington and Tehran boiled over onto Iraqi soil this month. The US killed top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad and Tehran retaliated against an Iraqi base hosting American soldiers, some of whom were hurt.
https://twitter.com/ColdWind11/status/1219954665485291520
Trump not ready to leave; raises issue with Iraqi President at Davos Summit
Furious at the US hit, Iraq’s parliament voted January 5 to oust all foreign troops, including about 5,200 American soldiers deployed alongside local forces.
Coalition troops have ostensibly reduced their operations in Iraq since then, even if cooperation with the Iraqi army continues discreetly, according to several US military sources.
US President Donald Trump and his Iraqi counterpart Barham Saleh agreed Wednesday in Davos, Switzerland on the need for a continued US military role in the country, the White House said, though the general sentiment has turned very Anti-US in the region, due to escalated US-Iran tensions.
Read more: ISIS fighters’ wives languish in Syria, looking for a way home
Trump’s misadventure against Iranian General Soleimani has surely endangered US presence in the region; the question that remains is that what waits for the war-torn region post US withdrawal – chaos or peace?
AFP with additional input from GVS News Desk