With ISIL moving towards urban warfare, serious questions regarding the efficacy of the US-led strategy remain.
The new US engagement, together with its key Arab partners, among them Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Jordan, represents a marked departure from the Obama administration's previous reluctance to get entangled in Syria's killing fields in the first place. Obama may have fired the first shot, but his successor will have to see the campaign through, as this strategy will not yield results for at least a few years - if ever. Without doubt, the air strikes will devolve into something much bigger over time.
A bottom-up approach must complement the top-down strategy pursued by the US and its allies. This involves working with local communities in Iraq and Syria, particularly the Sunnis who feel persecuted and excluded from the political and social space, and giving them a stake in the future in order to have them turn against ISIL and other extremists. Again, this is easier said than done.
The greater and more urgent task is to help rebuild fragile state institutions in the region and improve dismal socio-economic conditions which provide a fertile soil for nihilistic groups like ISIL.
Another pre-condition is to end the regional war-by-proxy between Sunni-dominated Saudi Arabia and Shia-dominated Iran which inflames sectarian tensions and supplies nourishment for ISIL. A grand bargain is needed whereby Iran and Russia are engaged and brought into this coalition. The prospects of this grand bargain are minimal.
Among so many unknown variables, ISIL will not simply wait passively. The group is adapting to new challenges, demonstrating tactical adjustments as well as consolidating control over major cities and provinces. It now governs over the lives of eight million Iraqis and Syrians. In a way, it has eight million hostages, a potentially frightening calamity.
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/09/air-strikes-syria-long-uncertai-201492462044683657.html
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