2003: The Architect of the Islamic State goes to Syria
After the fall of Saddam Hussein, the Americans dissolved his huge Sunni army, hoping to create an Arab Shia army that would be used by the Shia majority to rule Iraq, which in turn would become an American ally. Within the 250 thousand soldiers of the Iraqi army that was dissolved there are many officers who had been fighting the Americans for years and who had been trained by the Soviets and the KGB. See “Towards an Alliance Between Russia and ISIS”?
https://iakal.wordpress.com/2016/05/22/towards-an-alliance-between-russia-and-isis/
Many of the ex-people of Saddam Hussein joined Al-Qaeda of Iraq in order to make a career and earn a living, and also to fight the Americans. Haji Bakr was one of the many ex-officers of the secret services of Saddam Hussein who joined Zarqawi and Al-Qaeda after the fall of Iraq. Hadji Bakr was a very capable man and he started meeting Bashar al-Assad to organize the resistance.
In 2003 things in Iraq were simple, because the war in Syria hadn’t broke out yet, and therefore there was a relatively unified front against the Americans and the Kurds. I believe that even the Turks were happy with the attacks against the Americans.
Assad closely cooperated with the ex-officers of Saddam Hussein, in order to block the Americans in Iraq and stop them from moving to Syria.
Map Syria-Iraq
Things got a lot more complicated in 2011, when the Turks and the Qataris used the Muslim Brotherhood to attack Assad, in order to promote the Qatar-Turkey Pipeline. Now the Arabs of the Gulf and the Turks were at opposite sides from the Russians and the Iranians.
The Russians and the Alawites of Syria were afraid that NATO would support the Turks and the Qataris, and they were very right to believe so. Therefore Assad and the Russians asked Haji Bakr to prepare a plan for the creation of an Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, which would unify the Sunnis of Syria and Iraq, in order to attack the Americans at one end (Iraq), and in order to prevent the Americans from finding allies in Sunni Syria and Sunni Iraq. The Sunnis that would be supported by the Russians and Assad (ISIS) had to kill any rebels who would cooperate with NATO.
By using the ex-officers of Saddam Hussein Assad and the Russians were trying to take control of the Sunni parts of Syria and Iraq.
Map Sunni, Shia, Alawite, Kurdish Parts of Syria
http://cdn2.vox-cdn.com/assets/4396135/sunni-shia-kurd_state_crop.jpg
Assad gave the Sunni Jihadists he was supporting the oil fields of Sunni Syria, and he started buying their oil to finance them. In reality the Jihadists that were cooperating with Assad were run by the best people of Saddam Hussein who were simply using an Islamic “coating”.
Actually the oil of ISIS was bought from ISIS by a Russian businessman close to Putin. See Wall Street Journal “An Energy Mogul Becomes Entangled With Islamic State”, May 2016.
Assad and Putin allowed Turkey to buy cheap oil from ISIS too, in order to give Turkey the motive to support ISIS. And indeed Turkey cooperated closely with ISIS in the oil sector. Remember that when things between Turkey and Russia became ugly, with the downing of the Russian plane, Putin accused Erdogan’s son Bilal Erdogan for doing business with ISIS. See the state owned Russian news agency RT “Ankara's oil business with ISIS”, March 2016.
When Assad and Putin were angry with Erdogan, they would “fight” ISIS, by first informing ISIS, and then by substituting ISIS men with the men of Assad, in order to prevent Erdogan from doing business with ISIS i.e bying oil.
Another gift that Assad and Putin were giving Turkey with ISIS was that they allowed ISIS to hunt the Kurds of Syria, and that was a great gift for the Turks, because the Americans wanted rebels who would protect their Kurd allies. That’s why Erdogan was helping ISIS. ISIS was selling oil to Turkey, but more important than that ISIS was killing the Kurds of Syria, something forbidden by the Americans.
Essentially Putin and Assad were giving the Turks the chance to have the Sunni parts of Syira and Iraq, and also to buy the oil of the region, but only by using a force that would make sure NATO would never set foot there i.e. ISIS, which in turn means that the Qatar-Turkey pipeline would not be constructed.
The Iranians followed the example of the Russians and Assad, and in Sunni Syria they supported al-Nusra i.e. the subsidiary of Al-Qaeda. Al-Nusra was created in Syria by Al-Qaeda of Iraq, but there were many problems between Al-Qaeda of Iraq and Al-Qaeda of Syria, because Al-Qaeda of Iraq was the ex-people of Saddam Hussein who had promised the Russians and Assad not to attack Assad, and instead focus on building an Islamic State in the Sunni parts of Syria and Iraq.
Al-Qaeda of Syria i.e. al-Nusra, wanted to fight Assad, because the people of Saddam Hussein were mainly in Iraq and not in Syria. As a result there was fighting between Al-Qaeda of Iraq and Al-Qaeda of Syria, and in the end the Al-Qaeda of Iraq became ISIS. Al Qaeda of Syria i.e. al-Nusra broke ties with ISIS and started fighting both ISIS and Assad.
Al-Nusra was influenced by the mother company of Al-Qaeda, and she wanted to fight Assad. Remember that al-Qaeda is an Arab terror group, even though it was trained by Hezbollah and Iran. Al-Qaeda and Iran cooperated but they also fought each other.
Obviously not all the people of Saddam Hussein were working for Putin and Assad (ISIS). Some of them were working for Al-Qaeda too. It depends on who pays better.
In the end al-Nusra was bought by Qatar and she quit the global Jihad, and instead she focused on fighting ISIS and Assad. For the rebranding of al-Nusra see Business Insider “It looks like Al Qaeda is 'laying a trap' for the US — and giving Russia exactly what it wants”, July 2016.
In Syira you also had the Saudis fighting the Turks and the Qataris, because the Turks and the Qataris supported the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt (Mohammed Morsi), who was overturned with the blessings of Saudi Arabia and UAE. The Turks and the Qataris were also supporting the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria, and the Saudis did not want the Muslim Brotherhood of Syria to have a role in the Syrian opposition. Therefore the Turks and the Saudis were supporting different rebel groups in Syria.
In 2015, with the new Saudi King, Saudi Arabia accepted the Muslim Brotherhood to play a role in the Syrian opposition.
But the whole idea of supporting an Islamic State in Syria and Iraq was a very clever and ruthless plan of Putin and Assad. Islamic revolution and Islamic states are very popular in the Muslim World, and Putin and Assad just used a very common and popular idea to make the Sunni parts of Syria and Iraq forbidden zones for NATO.
Moreover, by uniting the Sunni parts of Syria and Iraq, and making them unreachable to the US with the use of ISIS, Assad and Putin were not only preventing the Americans from coming to Syria, but they were also attacking them at the other end of the road.
Map The Assad-Putin Plan
Obviously Assad and Putin know that at some point in the future they might have to face the Islamic State in Syria. But the Islamic State will not have the support of NATO and it will be easily wiped out by the Russians and the Syrians if they decide to do so at some point. Even if the Turks and the Qataris support ISIS they will not have NATO by their side.
Hilary Clinton wants to send American army in Syria, in order to destroy ISIS, but the Russians will not allow that, because they consider Syria to be under their protection. And obviously the Syrians and the Russians know that if the Americans “clean” Syria from the Jihadists they will be able to build an army which will be friendly to the West, and after that they might “push” the Qatar-Turkey gas pipeline with the support of Turkey and Qatar.
Obviously Putin will not say to Clinton “I do not want you to fight ISIS”, he will say that the Americans have no right to be in Syria.
The last chapter of the story, that is until July 2016, is the new agreement between Putin and Erdogan. They agreed that Putin will give Erdogan the Sunni part of Syria, and Erdogan will give Putin the Turkish Stream Pipeline. See “War or Peace”?
https://iakal.wordpress.com/2016/07/31/war-and-peace/
But things change so fast, so let’s wait to see what happens in August 2016.
A great article about how Assad organized the Islamic State is “The Terror Strategist: Secret Files Reveal the Structure of Islamic State”, April 2015.
Spiegel is the best political magazine of Europe. It is like the European Newsweek.
For the rise of the Islamic State see also “How Putin and Assad Created the Islamic State”.
https://iakal.wordpress.com/2016/07/28/how-putin-and-assad-created-the-islamic-state/
