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ISIS’s messaging is incredibly effective, largely due to its strategic emphasis on hybridized digital warfare. The organization fully coordinates its military and messaging campaigns with the support of a robust media bureaucracy.
The reemergence of Iraq's Shiite leadership comes as the Iranian regime now stands only on the religious claims of authority made by Ali Khamenei.
Ketti Davison forecasts ten likely outcomes of the twin crises in Syria and Iraq for the Defense One website. Among the threats to watch for: a degraded U.S. ability to target terror plotters and an opportunity for Russia as it carves out a leading regional role.
The ISIS attacks in Paris mark a step-change in the threat that group poses to the West. The tactics employed came straight from the battlefields of the Middle East into the heart of Europe. The group hit multiple targets simultaneously without detection by French security services despite a series of arrests aimed at disrupting this operation. That capability demonstrates superior planning ability, resilience, and operational security.
The initial Russian campaign to invade and conquer Ukraine is culminating without achieving its objectives—it is being defeated, in other words. The war is settling into a stalemate condition in much of the theater. But the war isn’t over and isn’t likely to end soon. Nor is the outcome of the war yet clear. The Russians might still win; the Ukrainians might win; the war might expand to involve other countries; or it might turn into a larger scale version of the stalemate in Ukraine’s east that had persisted from 2014 to the start of Russia’s invasion in February 2022. The failure of Russia’s initial military campaign nevertheless marks an important inflection that has implications for the development and execution of Western military, economic, and political strategies. The West must continue supplying Ukraine with the weapons it needs to fight, but it must now also expand its aid dramatically to help keep Ukraine alive as a country even in conditions of stalemate.
The series of bombings in Transnistria in late April was likely a false flag operation executed by the Kremlin intended to draw Transnistria into its invasion of Ukraine. Moscow’s effort was likely unsuccessful due to a fundamental misalignment of interests between the Kremlin and Viktor Gushan, the most powerful player in Transnistria. The Kremlin’s failure to coerce Transnistrian leadership could be part of the dynamic, along with recent Ukrainian battlefield successes, driving Moscow to annex occupied territory in Ukraine. This failure also demonstrates the extent to which Moscow’s proxies and allies are hesitant to join the Kremlin’s faltering invasion of Ukraine.
ISW Senior Fellow Lt. Gen. James M. Dubik (ret.) reviews Tom Ricks' latest book, The Generals.
