Propaganda 101
The US is currently engaged in a counterinsurgency campaign
against ISIS in Mosul city, Iraq. US officials and western media however castigated
Syria and Russia for a very similar campaign in eastern Aleppo which drove out
the insurgents who were dominated by al-Qaeda and supported by CIA-backed
rebels. As I explained
here, the primary goal of this propaganda campaign was
to stop the Syrian army from defeating the opposition and taking east Aleppo,
and failing that, to brand Syria and Russia as war criminals for having
defeated the US-backed opposition in a strategically important city. This also
served to direct attention away from inconveniences to US imperialism, such as
their reliance on an opposition dominated by al-Qaeda and the brutal way they
had conquered and subjugated Aleppo’s civilians.
It as well redirected the
narrative so that the only option discussed to reduce the civilian suffering was to stop the Syrian army’s offensive. Other, more practical
options which would have disadvantaged western imperialism, like the evacuation
of civilians or pressuring insurgent groups to stand down, were therefore
conveniently not considered. Hidden from view was the fact that America had essentially
supported al-Qaeda’s policy of preventing civilians from fleeing and using them
as human shields. By arguing that the civilians should be “allowed to stay in
their homes” in an active warzone, they effectively endorsed the human shield
policy and exploited the civilian suffering as this was advantageous and helped
them to oppose the defeat of their insurgents. If the civilians had been
evacuated, as had been proposed by Russia, there would have been nothing
stopping the Syrian army from besieging the militants and western officials
would not have been able to cry foul at their tactics. This is all part of
a long history of the US and its allies opposing the separation of civilians from
combatants as this would “be helping you [Syria and Russia] win.”
The
painting of Syria and Russia as the bad guys helps distract from the fact that this policy results in civilian deaths and exploits
human suffering for political ends, and redirects the public into thinking primary responsibility for the suffering rests on their enemy’s shoulders, and
not theirs.
Another means of accomplishing this is to depict similar
actions carried out by the US and its allies in a positive light. So, when the
US carries out siege warfare against ISIS in Mosul, using the same tactics as
Syria and Russia used against al-Qaeda in Aleppo, they are not portrayed as war
criminals but as liberators. In addition, to maintain the narrative that the US
and its clients are the white knights fighting against evil in the world key
historical inconveniences showing US policy to be the cause of the current
predicament are erased down the memory-hole. These help to explain the current
situation but put the US under a bad light, and betray the fact that the
military actions carried out by Russia and Syria actually have much more basis in legitimacy than US actions do.
How ISIS Came to Occupy Mosul
It must be remembered that the reason the US is
in Iraq to begin with was because of an unjustified act of quite deliberate
aggression and neo-colonialism based on
completely
false pretexts in order to gain a military footing in a strategically
important Middle Eastern nation and to exploit its substantial energy
resources. That act of aggression and subsequent
war fanned the flames of violence and instability which
created
the conditions from which extremists like the Islamic State and its
precursors were able to form and prosper.
In addition the US policy of arming and financing the “moderate”
opposition in Syria did much the same and led to the empowerment
of
radical Islamist groups from which the Islamic State itself was founded. The US then exploited the appearance of ISIS
and utilized their formation as a means to attack their geopolitical enemies. For example, the US-coalition’s “anti-ISIS”
airstrikes were conducted with the intent to push ISIS
away
from US-backed groups and allies (like in Kobani and Iraqi Kurdistan) while
neglecting
to strike them when battling the Syrian army or Hezbollah, as this would have
help their enemies.
Similarly, the US took no action to stop the Islamic State
from pushing into Iraq despite
long-term
prior
knowledge in order to exploit its offensive as a means to pressure then
Prime Minister al-Maliki to step down and install a more pliant ruler in his
place.
Elijah J. Magnier, one of the most well informed Middle East
journalists and the chief international correspondent for the Al Rai newspaper,
explains
that “as long as the aim of ISIS’s military activity and expansion was to
occupy land in Iraq, governed by pro-Iranian Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki
(creating a weak state and much confusion in the Iraq-Iran relationship)” then
“the ISIS presence in Iraq could be tolerated” by the US. This was further motivated by the fact that
“in Iraq, al-Maliki’s main objective, following an Iranian request witnessed by
the author, was to prevent the establishment of any US military base in the
country.” The US therefore “did not just
start taking a bunch of airstrikes all across Iraq as soon as ISIL came in,” Obama
explained, because “that would have taken pressure off of al-Maliki.” The resulting pressure from Iraq's military defeats to ISIS finally unseated the unwanted Prime Minister, the
Wall Street Journal explaining: "After the rout of the Iraqi military that year, combined pressure from Washington and Tehran led the Iraqi parliament to oust Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, seen in both capitals as responsible for the debacle, and to replace him with current Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi."
The motivation behind standing by as ISIS claimed large swaths of
land in order to depose an unwanted leader raises further questions about the nature in
which Mosul was overtaken.
US intelligence
had
predicted the fall of the city to an “Islamic state” of some kind a full
two years before it occurred, if, as explained, “the situation continues to
unravel” and support to the opposition continued, which was mainly empowering
jihadists. Yet the Syrian policy did
continue, and only intensified in the years after. Thus, when ISIS attacked the city the Iraqi
security forces of no less than 350,000 battle-hardened men simply “disintegrated
and fled” in the face of roughly 1,300 lightly-armed jihadis. One of these Iraqi soldiers explaining that
on the morning of June 10
th his commanding officer “told the men to
stop shooting, hand over their rifles to the insurgents, take off their
uniforms, and get out of the city.”
1
The town was simply handed over to ISIS by the Iraqi
commanders. Many were quick to explain
this as evidence of incompetence or disillusionment towards the political
leadership, yet it could just as well have been an adjunct to a strategy of
pressuring a change in government.
Two months after the June 2014 fall of Mosul to ISIS, al-Maliki
stepped
down as Prime Minister.
This is the history behind the ISIS occupation of Mosul that
does not get reported. It, of course,
not being the only explanation for the groups takeover of the city.
Other
factors, such as the post-invasion governmental repression of the country’s
Sunni minority, US counterinsurgency efforts targeting large segments of the
population under false pretexts of being “al-Qaeda adherents”, and systematic
torture and abuse by the US military all contributed to the deep sectarian
tensions and legitimate grievances which have empowered extremism and helped
solidify ISIS’ hold over the country.
Yet now, like the arsonist who comes to extinguish the fire,
the US is engaged in another bloody military operation that is wreaking havoc
on a civilian population in order to eradicate the original problem of the
Islamic State occupying Mosul city, a situation which their own policies helped
to create.
On the other hand, Syria is fighting against a
foreign-backed insurgency dominated by extremists like al-Qaeda, which is being
supported by the world’s leading superpower and other powerful allies. Russia, apart from its other crimes, is operating
in Syria in full accordance with international law and is assisting an ally who
is being attacked by foreign powers. The
US-led coalitions actions against the Islamic State in Syria
are illegal and in
violation of international law and various UN resolutions and in places like
Iraq have no base in legitimacy, especially given the
history
of
coalition
members' support
for the group in the first place.
Syria, therefore, has a much stronger argument for the use
of military force within their territory.
The fact that the media continually fail to mention this, is
also quite telling.
Notes:
1.) Patrick Cockburn, The Rise of the Islamic State: ISIS and the New Sunni Revolution, pg.15.
