Detail - 2014

June 5, 2014 - Rise of ISIS in a large amount of territory in western Syria and northern Iraq cause western nations to confront another round of Islamic fundamentalism. United States and some allies begin campaign to degrade their effectiveness with a bombing campaign on September 22.



The area of western Syria, northern Iraq, and many other regions of the middle east had been a hot bed of war involving the United States and other western nations since the acts of 9/11. They were wars attacking islamic fundamentalism, and one, the War in Iraq started by President George W. Bush thinking that weapons of mass destruction were there under the regime of Saddam Hussein, had been ongoing on that incorrect assumption. The assumption, however, that the problems associated with Islamic fundamentalism were over, were not, despite the announcement by President Obama on December 15, 2011, that the war was over and combat troops would come home.

The problem was, the war against a rogue nation, Iraq, may have been over, but the problems associated with an ideology, not of the majority of the citizens of Iraq, but of powerful groups, had just morphed into an even more brutal and dangerous foe. The rise of ISIS had begun, even before the declaration by President Obama that Bush's was over. An offshoot of al-Queda in Iraq, it was founded by Abu Musab al Zarqawi in 2004, but faded into the landscape after the surge of troops in 2007. By 2011, it had begun to reemerge, and by 2013, it was known as ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, with major strikes in June 2014 against Mosul and Tikrit. They had already captured Raqqa in January. Their goal of a califate was announced by Abu Bakr al Baghdadi on June 29, 2014 to stretch from Aleppo to Diyali.

The califate would grow and grow until it was effectively in control of enough land to be called a state. How much land? At its zenith in June 2015, thirty-three percent of Syria and forty percent of Iraq, including Mosul, Iraq's 2nd largest city, and Raqqa, in Syria, which they deemed their capital. They, ISIS, would call it the Islamic State.

How the World and United States Responded

After the June attacks on Mosul and Tikrit, it was impossible for the rest of the world to pretend that another conflict in Iraq and Syria had begun in earnest, with nightly images of brutality against citizens, including women, and their enemies at some of the worst levels of mankind's inhumanity. The U.S. began air attacks against ISIS in Iraq on August 7, 2014; one month later they expanded them into Syria. Despite eight thousand air strikes over the next year, ISIS had managed to gain territory near Aleppo, and held onto much of their land, outside losses near the Turkish border and near Ramadi.

While their height of the califate may have been in June 2015, the war continued with an expansion into affiliate terrorism. An Egypt adjunct bombed a Russian airplane, killing two hundred and twenty-four; there were coordinated attacks in Paris that killed one hundred and thirty; and an attack in Orlando, Florida by an ISIS supporter killed two dozen.

Over the next two years, continued bombing raids as a coalition of nations and the activities of the Syrian Democratic Force (a coalition of Syrian Kurds and Arabs) reduced their territory by ninety-five percent. By 2018, the fight pushed into their final territory in eastern Syria with the capture of Hajin on December 14, 2018.

On December 19, 2018, President Donald Trump declared ISIS defeated and that he would withdraw the two thousand troops that were supporting the SDR. After the final battle by the SDR against ISIS on March 23, 2019 in Baghouz, ISIS could claim no territory and a mass amount of prisoners were captured. On October 26, 2019, ISIS leader Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, was killed in northern Syria during a U.S. operation.

Quick Facts About ISIS

ISIS was an Islamist militant jihadist group that followed a Salafi jihadist doctrine based on a radicalized version of the Sunni branch of Islam.

Groups that supported or were deemed ISIS affiliated operated in Algerian Province, Caucasus Province, Central Africa Province, East Asia Province, Gaza Province, Greater Sahara Province, Khorasan Province-Pakistan Province, Libyan Province, Sinai Province, Somalia Province, West Africa Province, and Yemen Province.

The estimates for how many members of ISIS were involved in the attacks to create the califate are wide ranging, from 61,200 to 257,900. At the height of the califate in mid-2015, ISIS controlled an area with between eight and twelve million people. They were ruled under ISIS' version of sharia law.

ISIS was funded by two billion dollars, three-quarters coming from the capture of the central bank of Mosul and other commercial banks in the city.

Opponents of the Islamic State included the nations of Afghanistan, Canada, France, India, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Mozambique, Nigeria, Philippines, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, European Union, United Kingdom, United States, and Yemen. It was termed, by the United States, as Operation Resolve.

The highest amount of ground troops sent, mostly in support roles, by the United States during the fight against ISIS was 4,400. Some remain today to forestall any reemergence. Air strikes were taken by the air forces of the United States, Australia, Canada, Great Britain, the Netherlands, France, Jordan, Morocco, Iraq, and Turkey. Some reports state that Iran also conducted air strikes against ISIS targets in Iraq.

By August 9, 2017, the Coalition had conducted thirteen thousand three-hundred strikes in Iraq, and eleven thousand two hundred and thirty-five strikes in Syria in support of Operation Inherent Resolve. The cost of operations from August 8, 2014 to June 30, 2017 was approximately $14.3 billion.

Photo above: Map (cropped) of Air Strikes Against ISIS in 2014, 2014, Department of Defense, LTG W.C. Mayville. Courtesy Wikipedia Commons. Photo below: Montage (background) Map of largest held territory (in gray) of the Islamic State in June 2015, cropped, 2017, Tan Khaerr. Courtesy Wikipedia Commons, C.C. 4.0; (inset) supporting U.S. air strikes against ISIS during the Battle of Raqqa, 2017, U.S. Marine Corps. Courtesy Wikipedia Commons. Info source: Department of Defense; "Timeline: the Rise, Spread, and Fall of the Islamic State," 2019, wilsoncenter.org; Wikipedia Commons.

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President Barack Obama. Courtesy Wikipedia Commons.

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