ISIS cuts its fighters' salaries by 50%
money.cnn.com
money.cnn.com
If this is true, then why does ISIS get into financial trouble only now? The airstrikes in Syria have been going on already since September 2014. Did the USA realize that they should start bombing oil transports only recently?
On the other hand, Russia has claimed to have been bombing oil transports since the very start of their air campaign. Which happens to have started a couple of month ago. Maybe I'm too suspicious, but to me it looks like ISIS is getting into trouble because of the recent Russian intervention, and not because the USA.
Then income tax is 20m homes, avg 2300€ per home.
The person you were replying to specifically stated income tax to highlight their point.
http://www.news.com.au/world/middle-east/footage-shows-bombi...
1. When ISIS moves into a city they appropriate everything of value. During their initial expansion they built up quite a war chest, but their expansion has stopped for now so they are not adding funds that way. 2. ISIS makes most of its money by taxing civilians. The oil bombings are targeting the small piece of pie, not the big piece.
Here's my theory: ISIS ran into a classic problem seen by several startup companies. They saw initial success and had fast growth. They wanted to keep growing so they recruited heavily. To recruit a lot of soldiers they promised generous pay and benefits and even offered to support the families of soldiers so dads could go fight. Their burn rate was astronomical, but was okay because they were staying ahead of it through growth. But the growth ended up being unsustainable, because competition arrived and contained them. They kept it up for a long time because they had a lot of funding, but their burn rate finally caught up to them since they haven't been able to keep growing as before. Leadership did not/have not made the transition from wild startup CEOs that give pitch talks and sell to investors into the sensible, sustainable CEOs that manage a company in a saturated market with an eye toward creating a mature company. Remaining in the mode of a wild growth startup company is not an option for these guys. There is no viable strategy for a terrorist group that says "we'll grow like crazy and then sell out to Apple/Facebook/Google/Microsoft while we are popular and they'll handle the maturity stages. Terrorists have to make the maturity transition themselves because they can't be bought out.
It's hard to make an alliance with someone who already funded you.
There are several sides to the Syrian Civil War. The Free Syrian Army is different from ISIS
In a very interesting interview conducted by Al Jazeera a few months back, the head of Al Nusra Front stated that ISIS and the Syrian government/Hezbollah never really fought each other.
This is also the messy part of civil war to survive alliances are fleeting. And so it is totally believable that some weapons given by the West to support FSA ended up in Isis hand willingly.
Al Nusrah is the new hip and modern wing of Al Qaida. They are now so moderate and progressive that only stone women using Fair Trade stones.
A funny thing about the oil transports is that until not so long ago they were sort of a public secret. Because it was Turkey, USA's NATO ally, where most of those transports were going to, but Turkey was of course denying that.
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/01/19/oil-prices-fall-further-on-gl...
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2014-02-11-clash-of-cl...
Call it ~1,000 / month or ~30$ a day. Let's assume 1/3 of that 1 million / day goes to fighters and the rest is overhead. ~= 10,000 fighters which is a significant force and importantly it's replaceable with new recruits.
PS: Though that could significantly understate things if the average is closer to say 500$ per month and / or overhead is lower and paid with other income sources.
Anyway poking around the web it looks like they are somewhere between 7,000 and 35,000 fighters which seems to be in the right ballpark for 1Million / day revenue.
PS: And of course graft is a major issue.
This doesn't change the overall thrust of your point. Just noting for accuracy only.
Bro culture?
>There is no viable strategy for a terrorist group that says "we'll grow like crazy and then sell out to Apple/Facebook/Google/Microsoft
What ?
If you want to pick apart my comparison, use specific details rather than complaining that the "analogy fails" without offering any support. Sure, startup companies don't kidnap and murder innocent civilians, but I think its a fair comparison when talking about financials and paying employees.
Why do you say that?
I think that's exactly what it is. It's a shitty business though. It's business is war and conquest and rape and pillage and destruction. But in the end it has a budget, it has a start date, it has employees, it has a stated plan, it recruits, etc... What else do you want in an organization to make it a company?
If it looks like a duck and sounds like a duck...
https://news.vice.com/article/a-leaked-budget-may-finally-sh...
http://www.npr.org/2015/12/10/459249994/leaked-budget-docume...
But, really, that's beside the point. The how. The important thing is the what. And that is they are getting financially squeezed.
And their pay scales allow for internal dissent since foreign fighters get paid twice the rate of their locals...
Good to see them make poor decisions.
Primarily this was to avoid unnecessary civilian and collateral damage:
"Until Monday, the United States refrained from striking the fleet used to transport oil, believed to include more than 1,000 tanker trucks, because of concerns about causing civilian casualties. As a result, the Islamic State’s distribution system for exporting oil had remained largely intact."
Plus why destroy infrastructure required by civilians during peacetime if you don't have to? That just puts them in a worse position when all this is done.
> A former CIA director said the U.S.-led coalition fighting the Islamic State has been reluctant to attack oil wells controlled by the extremist group partly because of environmental concerns. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/nov/25/michael-more...
Suddenly the US becomes the protector of mother earth?
Any tactical enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend inclinations towards supporting ISIS that Saudi might have are are also rather tempered by the fact that wresting control of Mecca from the American-allied kleptocrats of the House of Saud is rather close to the top of the Islamic State's to-do list. Which actually makes them more of a threat than Assad or Iranian-backed Shia militias
The suggestion that Turkey is a sufficiently influential ally for the US to not just disregard but actively encourage cross border black market oil trade with ISIS is almost as silly.
ISIS are Sunnis. Saudis are Sunnis. Iran, Syria are Shia (as are Hezbollah). That's one factor. The other is: some regimes have it in for Assad; they want to get rid of him. They'll support anybody taking on Assad. That's another factor.
ISIS being Sunnis actually makes them more dangerous to the House of Saud, since they represent a challenge to their legitimacy as rulers rather than their population's natural enemy. Similarly, the US damaging the ISIS economy and prestige actually strengthens Saudi Arabia's position as the benefactor-of-choice for aspirant Sunni militants.
Historically, generals of strong empires tend to go fight rebellions or weaker enemy states for prolonged time even if they could destroy them quickly. They do that to maintain power, or the empire will have no more enemies and the military's influence drops.
I'm not saying that's what happened in this case, but that is one of many reasons American entities (military, politicians, whatever) act against some other Americans' interests.
Of course, that attitude is pretty much due to the previous administration being too naively adventurous and stupidly causing big messes that are still causing problems.
And the previous administrations attitude is due to them thinking the problems were caused by the previous previous administration being too weak in their military responses.
etc etc ad infinitum...
Do you want to permanently destroy Iraq's and Syria's ability to create oil?
As long as ISIS wasn't considered a major threat, there was no real reason to bomb the refineries and wells (causing permanent damage to Syria). Now that ISIS is being taken as a more serious threat, the permanent damage to Syria has been deemed acceptable.
So that's how it went down. Did I get that right?
"Guys, at first we thought ISIS wouldn't take root as successfully as they have, so we didn't want to damage Iraqi and Syrian infrastructure (which will then have to be rebuilt). But they did take root, so now we have to suck it up and bomb the infrastructure."
The thing is ISIS will lose, it's not a question of if but a question of when. Unlike a fairy tale there won't be a happy end afterwards though. These countries will have to be moved back on track and need to become stable. That requires state building which takes time, is expensive and very unpopular with voters.
Additionally these strikes themselves cost lots of money. It also makes sense to avoid civilian casulties to not further support ISIS and other terrorist organizations in their recruitment, which is already going better than anyone would like.
If you think ahead, I don't think you can come to any other choice than to try to minimize damage, especially to important infrastructure like this.
Yes and no. Note that the Iraq War was funded by Americans, and that Iraq kept its own oil fields and refineries.
It's unfair to compare the say... Eisenhower administration (1953 Iran revolution, which oil was a big part of) against the Bush administration (2000s Iraq invasion) and assume the policies are the same.
The evidence, as far as I can tell, is that the Bush tried to do the right thing with regards to Iraq's oil. The fallacy of the Bush administration was believing that the Muslim world would love us after we killed the only secular leader in the region. But I don't see any evidence that oil had much to do with the decision.
The 1953 Iran mistake is certainly a mistaken coup with regards to oil.
The 2001 Iraq mistake was one of hubris, a lack of understanding about the Muslim world, and most importantly, piss poor intelligence (WMDs wasn't "Bush's lie", it was the failure of the entire US intelligence community)
The key word is claimed. Like everything Putin's propaganda spews out, it couldn't be farther from the truth.
With regards to the oil traffic, I do not understand why we, instead of bombing, get a hold of those tankers and use that oil. Oil is precious and finite.
Obviously they had to read some Arabic when studying the Quran, but I doubt that would be sufficient.
On a related note, Charlie Winter published a brilliant essay on the ISIS media strategy on the BBC a couple of months ago, Fishing and ultraviolence[1]. Highly recommended.
[1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-88492697-b674-4c69-8...
(edit: removed superfluous and)
I once witnessed a bunch of fresh recruits tonelessly mumbling through the 'Voila du boudin' as best as they could. It was awesome.
Either way, what I find fascinating is that ISIS must be way more complex and sophisticated than is typically portrayed in media. The image that I have is that of barbarians - but in reality, they must have established some level of civil administration - a jihadist bureaucracy. Would love to learn more about this, in case any journalist is reading this.
[1] http://www.cracked.com/blog/isis-wants-us-to-invade-7-facts-...
ISIS is primarily made up of ex Saddam Hussein henchmen who know a lot about running a state.
2. I doubt they'd "downsize" just because some of their recruits don't speak Arabic well. They need and want all the bodies they can get. I'm sure there's enough overlap in language skills for effective communication.
3. They want to present the image of a civil government, but really it's a jihadist bureaucracy based on what most would consider barbarism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_State_of_Iraq_and_the_...
Language is not the problem. They coordinate in Arabic, and usually if there is a Turkish or non-Arabic cell, they usually have a single Arabic speaker.
Their primary problem that ISIL has is that they lack professionals (accountants, engineers, computer scientists).
[1]: Actually some do speak Turkish somewhat fluently, but I can't tell if being able to describe your favorite cocktail to a bartender in a Turkish hotel proves that you can describe further tactics to fellow combatants under suppressive fire.
This.
They're trying to set up an autonomous government and country under Sharia law. One of the main tenets of the Caliphate is the idea of holding sway over territory - without territory there is no Caliphate.
In order to hold territory, they need professionals to support the infrastructure of their Caliphate, otherwise, it falls apart. From all the media reports, it would seem this has been the Achilles heel of the organization from the start:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/the-islamic...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/islams-d...
And that doesn't even take into account people who might speak Albanian, Armenian, French, Farsi, Kurdish, English, Pashto, Balochi, Dari, Tajik, Bengali, Russian, Urdu, or one of the Turkic languages.
Given the public image and media strategy of the group, I guess that Arabic is their common tongue, even if English would be more effective.
http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/12/04/458524627/episo...
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/flashcontrol/mfidm...
What we need is a way to mute the browser by default, with selective un-muting of particular tabs once we decide we want to hear them.
An option to remember mute state for a whitelist of sites would be nice too.
I'm amazed browser vendors don't offer this. All the fancy features they build, but this one has alluded them. Auto-playing videos are the worst thing about desktop web browsing. I cannot think of a worse problem.
"We want revolution! But first we have to cut wages for the revolutionaries. Sorry!"
This is in firefox btw.
Honestly did not expect that. The world is more complex that portrayed.
A lot of times these groups are doing more for local populations in terms of making sure they have food and basic necessities than the government. Usually when this is happening, it's a pretty strong indictment of the official government.
(For instance, you might be inclined to try drawing a simple line between the two based on "the consent of the governed". Which is all fine and dandy at a social scale, but what does that mean to you as an individual? Have you tried removing your consent from your local government? The question is not as easy as it may look at first. Even as, again, I want to emphasize that I think it can be answered reasonably; just not easily.)
(Which I suppose also further underlines the point I want to emphasize about how I'm trying to promote a food-for-thought question, not a value judgment. Personally I find ISIS contemptible as an organized crime mob, and I find them contemptible as a government. I have no plans to change my opinions based on which side of the line they fall on. Which one are they on, though? Honestly the answer probably varies by region at this point. You can make a case that Westphalian-style countries are dead in the Middle East, and a stronger case that they are at least trending down. Whether that trend will be permanent is anyone's guess.)
except for outside recognition of legitimacy, the line can be thin.
(and it is, since people jump from one to another easily)
This is why I cannot give much credibility to anarcho-capitalist states. Simply removing a visible state does not preclude shadow governments from forming.
If a government is formed, shadow or not, wouldn't that necessitate removal of the "anarcho" qualifier?
In a similar vein, it seems to me that the term "anarcho-anything state" is logically inconsistent, unless one exclusively uses the "chaos; disorder" definition for "anarcho-" instead of the "without rulers" definition.
It clearly shows the group's violent rhetoric and uncompromising ideology, but also illustrates that ISIS is far more than a war machine. They are trying to create a nation, and that includes civic law enforcement and social services. For many people in the conquered regions, it represents more stability than whatever was there before. Of course, there are many others who are terrorized by ISIS (typically because they do not adhere to the correct brand of religion in the correct way) but it's important to remember that there is a fair-sized contingent of civilians on the ground who welcome ISIS.
I think a lot of these people would prefer a strong, sane national government that isn't at war with everybody and lets people live their lives. But that doesn't seem to be an option, and ISIS is the best they've had recently.
Arab sunni muslims in Sinjar raped, sold and murdered their own non-muslim neighbours as soon as ISIS strolled into town. They weren't forced, they were greeting them with open arms evident by photos.
I don't like to entertain the notion about whitewashing ISIS as some sort of a sensible "muslim alternative", not that I'm accusing you to suggest that. I'm just noticing that pattern here more and more, some serious high level of naivety of people who've never experienced living in those areas and conditions.
Both Lee Kuan Yew and Pim Fortuyn are gone. Not much hope left.
I think this is important to understand, because without that chaos ISIS wouldn't have had this fertile ground in which to grow. If Iraq and Syria hadn't been left to disintegrate, ISIS wouldn't have gone anywhere. Looking at the future, if and when ISIS is destroyed, it's essential to ensure that some form of order is established in these areas, or else we'll just be back at it again in a few more years.
It's increasing...
Even if some of those militias were better than the new stable regime.
The generalization about what Sunni Muslims want is quite gross.
Pretty sure killing/punishing apostates isn't frowned upon in Sunni world. You can dress it up either way you want.
BTW, the word "state" in "Islamic State..." makes it pretty clear: they're offering state functions. Guess how modern nation-states started: killing rivals, providing security and services to populations inside their boders, establishing central cultures...
Of course ISIS needs to be smashed. But note how many nations still celebrate depraved monsters like Christopher Columbus. (Consider that when wondering why people fall for ISIS propaganda. Falling for that kind of propaganda is extremely common; we all do.)
Drug cartels use PR to make people loyal to them. I'd imagine ISIS is doing something relative
Another tidbit I heard is that in Afghanistan, many were defecting from the Taleban to Isis because the pay was higher. It seems that in some poor/rural areas, being a fighter is more a career than anything.
Many of them also know there won't be much evidence of their heinous crimes, so once they come back they will go scotch free as few countries have actually made ISIS illegal (as the SS became).
0. Suspected 300 returned to Sweden according to hospital treatments of war injuries.
1. 120~ actual confirmed ISIS pedophiles returned.
2. 4(?) jailed because they hade photage of themselves raping and murdering.
No proof of these leaked docs.
(^took this from Reddit)