ISIS, Iraq & Destabilization as Strategy
ISIS and Iraq present an interesting – and often contradictory – tale of foreign policy and regional politics in the Middle East: with support from Arab dictatorships, it begins to turn against them; moving into Iraq, it provided the Americans with leverage against a recalcitrant puppet; the Saudis sought to undermine Iraq and Iran, and it brought Iran and America closer together; it emerged from the civil war in Syria, where the US and Gulf states aided in its surge; they arm it in Syria and fight it in Iraq. The regional implications are alarming when power politics are at play. Caught in between, as always, are the largely poor and oppressed populations, subject to the whims and wars of dictatorships, imperial powers, terror groups and a game of empire.
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