ISIS Goes Global: Fight the Islamic State by Targeting Its Affiliates

Author(s): Daniel Byman

Source: Foreign Affairs , MARCH/APRIL 2016, Vol. 95, No. 2 (MARCH/APRIL 2016), pp.
76-85
Published by: Council on Foreign Relations

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/43948181

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 ISIS Goes Global
Fight the Islamic State by Targeting
Its Affiliates

Daniel Byman

Peninsula last October, for which the Islamic State (also

The Peninsula known known
downingas isis)
as isis)claimed
last ofresponsibility,
a October, claimed Russianprove
may ultimately responsibility, for passenger which plane the may Islamic over ultimately Egypt's State prove Sinai (also
more consequential than the horrific attacks in Paris and San Ber-
nardino, California, that followed. Western security officials had long
worried that their countries' own citizens would conduct attacks after
returning home from Iraq or Syria or strike out as "lone wolf' terror-
ists. But the Russian plane crash, which killed 224 people, was caused
by a different beast: neither lone wolves nor isis itself but an isis
affiliate that had pledged its loyalty to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, isis'
self-declared caliph. Isis calls these groups wilayat, Arabic for
"provinces." (The term is borrowed from the seventh century, when
the armies of Islam burst out of the Arabian Peninsula and established
regional governors who ruled in the name of the caliph; isis also uses
wilayat to refer to administrative divisions within Iraq and Syria.) If,
as recent events suggest, isis' far-flung provinces have begun closely
aligning their actions with those of the group's core leadership in Iraq
and Syria, then isis' geographic scope has expanded vastly.
Although alarming, such expansion is not unprecedented. After 9/11,
several of al Qaeda's affiliates eclipsed that group's central command in
both size and importance. One of them, al Qaeda in the Arabian Pen-
insula (aqap), has repeatedly tried to down U.S. airplanes and remains
a deadly threat today. Aqap claimed responsibility for the January 2015
Charlie Hebdo attack in Paris, and last May, Michael Morell, a former

DANIEL BYMAN is a Professor at Georgetown University's Edmund A. Walsh School of

Foreign Service and Director of Research at the Center for Middle East Policy at the
Brookings Institution. He is the author of AI Qaeda , the Islamic State , and the Global J i had ist
Movement: What Everyone Needs to Know . Follow him on Twitter @dbyman.

76 FOREIGN AFFAIRS

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 ISIS Goes Global

deputy director of the cia, said that aqap retained "the ability to bring
down an airliner in the United States of America tomorrow."
Isis itself also began as an al Qaeda franchise. Following the U.S.
invasion of Iraq in 2003, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi emerged as a leader
of jihadist forces in Iraq. In 2004, he pledged allegiance to Osama bin
Laden and changed his organization's name from the Organization of
Monotheism and Jihad to al Qaeda in Iraq (aqi). After Zarqawi's
death, in 2006, the group took on other names, including the Islamic
State of Iraq. When Baghdadi took over in 2010, the organization was
on its last legs. Local Sunnis had turned against it, undermining its
operations. When U.S. forces pulled out of the country in 2011, the
Iraqi government they left behind seemed ascendant.
But Baghdadi's group rose from the ashes, exploiting the marginal-
ization of Iraqi Sunnis and the Syrian civil war. In 2013, Baghdadi
changed his group's name yet again, to the Islamic State of Iraq and
al-Sham. In 2014, after his fighters captured the Iraqi city of Mosul,
his ambitions grew further: he declared a caliphate over the Muslim
world, shortening the group's name to the Islamic State. Now, isis has
eclipsed al Qaeda in size and strength; it has also outpaced its former
master in spawning affiliates, establishing ever-larger numbers of
franchises and supporters throughout the Muslim world.
The provinces pose a serious threat to Western interests: they en-
able isis to expand its reach and make local groups more deadly in
their regional conflicts. Hotbeds of jihad that have not yet exported
terrorism to the West may do so in the future if local groups strengthen
their ties to isis.
Yet the United States and its allies are only just beginning to factor
the provinces into their counterterrorism strategy. In his last major
address on isis, in December, U.S. President Barack Obama focused
on the terrorist threat that the group's core in Iraq and Syria posed to
the United States, without even mentioning the group's provinces.
The Pentagon has been taking the danger more seriously and has
considered establishing additional military bases in Africa, Asia, and
the Middle East partly in response. But the United States and its allies
must go further, developing a comprehensive strategy to weaken isis'
various franchises. They should start by taking advantage of the tensions
that will probably arise between isis' leadership in Iraq and Syria and
its more remote branches. Al Qaeda's affiliates eventually became a
burden for its core, demanding resources, ignoring its directives, and

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Daniel Byman

tarring its name by conducting unpopular attacks. Isis will likely

encounter similar problems. To ensure that it does, the United States
should aim to disrupt communication between the main group and its
provinces and work with allies new and old to target the latter directly.
If the West is ever to defeat isis, it will have to work against the group
as a whole, not just against its most visible part.

GOING BIG

As is well known, the heart of isis lies in the Sunni-populated parts

of Iraq and Syria, and the organization's core splits its headquarters
between Mosul and Raqqa. Yet isis claims to be the legitimate ruler
of all Muslims, and it operates throughout the Muslim world. It has
already declared wilayat in parts of Afghanistan, Algeria, Egypt, Libya,
Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and the Caucasus. Terrorists
or fighters operating in isis' name have also conducted attacks in
Bangladesh and Kuwait.
So far, the most worrisome provinces are those in Egypt and Libya.
The Egyptian affiliate, Sinai Province, which used to call itself Ansar
Beit al-Maqdis, pledged loyalty to Baghdadi in 2014. At first, this oath
seemed to mean little, and the group's fighters continued to focus
their attacks on Egypt's military and police. But they soon began to
raise their ambitions, going after un targets, beheading a Croatian
expatriate (supposedly in revenge for Croatia's participation in the
international anti-isis coalition), and attacking the Italian consulate
in Cairo. And then they downed the Russian airliner.
The Libyan province emerged from the strife that followed the
overthrow of the Libyan dictator Muammar al-Qaddafi in 2011. Qaddafi
had faced a jihadist threat for years, and as countrywide unrest turned
to outright conflict, local jihadists became more powerful. As isis
began to grab headlines, its brand became more compelling to local
fighters; a courtship blossomed, and Libyan fighters pledged their
loyalty to Baghdadi in 2014.
Today, the Libyan affiliate poses a particularly serious threat to
Western interests because its fighters, unlike their counterparts in Egypt,
do not face strong government opposition. The group has as many as
3,000 active members, and its fighters have beheaded Ethiopian Coptic
workers and attacked the Moroccan and South Korean embassies.
Although the group's fighters have not yet mounted an international
attack, they hold the Mediterranean city of Sirte and adjacent towns

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 ISIS Goes Global

When local goes global: in Paris after the Charlie Hebdo attack, January 2015

along the Libyan coast, where they've created a mini-caliphate, dispens-

ing brutal justice and enforcing social codes as the core organization
does in its Iraqi and Syrian heartlands.
Figuring out where exactly isis has established a formal presence and
where local fighters are merely emulating the group can be difficult. In
Bangladesh, isis has claimed responsibility for bombings, stabbings,
and shootings of Shiite and Western targets, but it is unclear if these
attacks are directly linked to the core group. Nigeria's Boko Haram has
endorsed and sworn loyalty to isis, but the Nigerian extremist group
has multiple commanders, and these claims have not been matched by
any significant change in operations, suggesting that the relationship
between the two groups remains more distant than it may seem.
In places where isis does have a more formal presence, foreign fight-
ers play an important role creating and maintaining ties between the
&
local group and the core. More than any other modern terrorist group,
w
G
H
W
isis relies on volunteers from abroad: by the end of 2015, roughly 25,000
foreigners from Arab countries and 5,000 from Western states had
*>
00

fought with it in Iraq and Syria, and the ranks of outsiders keep grow-
O
O
Z

ing. These fighters act as communication channels, bringing local

N
>
r
O
u
c
concerns to isis and Baghdadi's vision back to their countries of origin
m
ss
H
when they return. When the so-called Afghan Arabs, who had fought
W
C/5
with the mujahideen against the Soviet Union in the 1980s, returned

March/April 2016 79

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Daniel Byman

home, they spread their ideology to local groups, giving al Qaeda infor-
mal networks throughout the Muslim world. Today, isis is engaged in
similar activity, but more rapidly and on a far more massive scale, even
winning over groups formerly linked to al Qaeda. Many of these groups,
particularly those in North Africa, worked frequently with isis when it
was still an al Qaeda affiliate.
Accepting the isis label often leads local groups to shift their tactics
and ideology. In addition to fighting local government forces and rival
groups as they did before, many affiliates begin making sectarian attacks
and targeting Westerners in the region. In a particularly brutal but
effective form of violent propaganda, they often behead their victims
and carefully choreograph and videotape the executions for broad dis-
semination. When possible, as in parts of Libya, provinces also adopt an
isis-style governance structure, complete with police, courts, and taxes.
Unlike some of al Qaeda's affiliates, they do not try to form lasting alli-
ances with other rebel groups, and they tend to have little respect for
local authority figures, with tribal leaders an important exception.
So far, however, no isis province has attacked targets in the West.

YOU BELONG WITH ME

Local groups are attracted to isis for many reasons. One of the most
important is the most obvious: genuine conviction. As nauseating as isis
is to most Muslims, it has tapped into the beliefs of an important subset
of Sunni Muslims, particularly young men. Isis trumpets sectarianism,
portraying itself as the defender and avenger of Sunnis worldwide
Moreover, the group's slick videos and social media campaigns attract
even young Sunnis who lack real religious knowledge or conviction by
playing into their desires for adventure and a sense of purpose. As
General David Rodriguez, the commander of U.S. Africa Command,
has noted, groups affiliate themselves with isis "to elevate their cause."
Of course, some groups join isis for more practical purposes, such
as access to financial or technical aid. According to The New York
Times, in Afghanistan, isis offered Taliban fighters several hundred
thousand dollars for their support to gain more territory and recruits.
Isis also helps local groups improve the quality of their propaganda:
after strengthening ties with isis in 2014, for example, Boko Haram
was able to elevate its outreach from grainy videos taken on hand-held
cameras to more polished productions distributed via Twitter. Isis
offers its provinces access to experienced fighters and has sent hun-

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 ISIS Goes Global

dreds of its troops to Libya (some of whom originally hailed from

there) to help its supporters. Finally, taking on the isis brand allows
local commanders to split from al Qaeda or other existing groups
without provoking a backlash from their followers. It allows aspiring
leaders to mask their power grabs with claims of doctrinal purity.
The provinces offer benefits to the core, too. Adding new affiliates
bolsters isis' self-image by making the organization seem more pow-
erful and attractive. Shortly after pro-
claiming a caliphate in 2014, Baghdadi
If the West is to defeat ISIS,
declared all local jihadist groups and
emirates subservient to isis. When it will have to target the
new provinces sign up, they appear group
to as a whole.
fulfill that vision. They also give isis
strategic reach, allowing it to tap into fighters and networks around
the Middle East. Libya, for example, offers a base for striking nearby
Egypt and Tunisia.
Charles Lister, a fellow at the Middle East Institute, has described
the provinces as part of isis' "ink spot" strategy. The provinces
themselves are mini Islamic states that will expand through prosely-
tizing and war. As the ink spots expand, the borders will meet up,
forming a larger entity. And as more and more provinces pledge
allegiance to isis, they may encourage other independent groups to
do the same.
The affiliates also give the core group fallback options, creating
potential refuges for its leaders in case isis is defeated or crippled in
Iraq or Syria. In The New York Times, one U.S. Defense Department
official called isis' heavy involvement in Libya "contingency planning."
After the death of bin Laden, local al Qaeda affiliates, especially in
Yemen, offered al Qaeda a way to keep itself in the news even as the
core organization found itself on the run; isis' provinces may serve a
similar function. Although isis today seems unstoppable to many
Westerners, it has lost around 40 percent of its Iraqi territory since
2014, in addition to much of its oil infrastructure and heavy forces.
One resident of Raqqa told The New York Times that isis' popularity
has diminished because it has "lost its brilliant victories." Although
isis has hardly been defeated, local setbacks have demoralized some of
its followers. By expanding into new territories, the group continues
to create headlines, allowing it to attract more foreign fighters to its
core organization.

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Daniel Byman

GOING TO EXTREMES

As isis grows beyond Iraq and Syria, so, too, does it spread its harsh
brand of religious intolerance. In 2015, the group's followers attacke
Shiite mosques in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen; beheaded Egyp
tian and Ethiopian Christians in Libya; and attacked security force
and Sunni Muslims deemed insufficiently devout. Not only are suc
attacks tragic in their own right; they also risk setting in motion
cycle of retaliation, as has already happened in Yemen. Such cycles
which lead to revenge attacks against Sunnis, only bolster the group
claim to being a defender of the faithful.
Growing sectarianism also threatens the legitimacy of the govern
ments of Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and other religiously divide
countries. In Saudi Arabia, for example, the government currently
finds itself in a dilemma: if it fails to stop isis from bombing Saud
Shiite mosques, it will embolden the extremists and show that it can
not protect its own people; yet if it cracks down on isis, it will ris
looking like the champion of the country's unloved Shiite minority
which could hurt its legitimacy among Sunni chauvinists.
The spread of isis will also worsen the region's refugee crisis. The group
embraces barbarism as strategy; beheadings, rape, and other grotesque ac
are not byproducts of its wars but deliberate tools to intimidate enemi
and reward supporters. In retaliation for a tribal revolt in Libya in Augu
2015, isis fighters killed dozens of members of the tribe, crucifying several
of them in a traffic circle - a punishment familiar to anyone following t
group's parade of horrors in Iraq and Syria. If the provinces expand, man
Muslims and religious minorities will flee rather than endure their rule.
From the West's perspective, however, the bigger concern is that as isi
grows, it will develop new staging grounds and operatives to use fo
international terrorist attacks. Baghdadi has called on Muslims abroad t
travel to Iraq and Syria or to the provinces, if they can; if they cannot,
has said they should focus on local attacks. Gone are the days when West
ern governments had to worry about only the foreign fighters traveling
to Iraq and Syria; increasingly, they have to worry about would-be jihadis
traveling to and from other isis bases around the region and beyond.

DOUBLE TROUBLE

Despite all the benefits provinces offer isis, they also come with th
share of trouble. For one thing, they can weaken the jihadist moveme
as a whole. Many of them exist because of local rivalries: members

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 ISIS Goes Global

rival groups spend their time killing one another rather than fighting
their supposed enemies. In Afghanistan, for example, the Taliban and
a renegade faction that has pledged loyalty to isis have warred for
control of Helmand Province, weakening both of them in their fight
against the Afghan government.
Just as al Qaeda did, isis may soon learn that not all affiliates are
obedient servants. When local groups, particularly strong ones, take on
the isis label, they retain their own command structure, personnel, and
parochial goals, and these often fit uneasily with those of the core
group. Time and again, al Qaeda found that many of its regional fran-
chises retained their traditional agendas, continuing to fight the local
fights they always had (although perhaps adding some local Western
targets to the mix). Al Qaeda's leaders
had particular difficulty controlling aqi,
Just as al Qaeda did , ISIS
which they thought spent too much en-
may soon learn that not
ergy killing ordinary Shiites and Sunni all
imams and other leaders who opposed affiliates are obedient
the group. When aqi bombed three
servants.
hotels in Amman, Jordan, in 2005, kill-
ing some 60 people, roughly 200 Islamic
scholars from 50 countries condemned the group, calling the killing of
noncombatants "among the gravest of sins." The ferocious criticism
tarnished al Qaeda's brand among many of its Muslim constituents.
As isis absorbs local groups, it will also take on the enemies they
make. Western officials told The New York Times that when the lead-
ers of Sinai Province decided to bomb the Russian plane, they did so
without consulting isis. The move provoked Russia, which until
then had limited its air strikes in Syria to attacks on the moderate
opposition, to launch cruise missiles at isis' forces and infrastructure
in Deir ez-Zor and Raqqa, among other targets.
This process works both ways; local groups that link up with isis can
also get themselves into trouble, painting bull's-eyes on their backs.
Again, the experience of al Qaeda is instructive. In 2010, bin Laden
discouraged the Somali militant group al Shabab from declaring alle-
giance to his organization because doing so would give "enemies" an
excuse to mobilize against al Shabab. Something similar is happening
now. Before the extremist groups in Egypt and Libya pledged allegiance
to isis, the United States cared little about them. Now it has zeroed in
on them. In November 2015, for example, a U.S. air strike near the port

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Daniel Byman

city of Darnah, Libya, killed an Iraqi who may have been the leader of
isis' affiliate there. By attacking local governments, the provinces also
risk pushing local regimes into the arms of the anti-isis coalition.
Joining up with isis can also cost affiliates local support. Outside ter-
rorist groups tend to be less in tune with conditions on the ground than
their native-born associates are. In 2003, for example, the al Qaeda
core pushed its Saudi affiliate to launch an insurgency prematurely,
despite local leaders' warnings that they were not prepared. The result
was a disaster: after the group conducted several terrorist attacks
against Western targets in the kingdom and strikes on Saudi security
forces, the Saudi government cracked down, killing or arresting most
of the group's members. Because foreign fighters lack grass-roots con-
nections, they also have few incentives to exercise restraint. When isis
tried to set up shop in Darnah in 2014, for example, its brutal behavior
alienated residents, who worked with rival groups to expel it. The
most successful terrorist groups, such as Hamas and Hezbollah, enjoy
close ties with their local populations. They use violence, but they also
carefully moderate their brutality. Isis has yet to learn that lesson.

A NEW STRATEGY

Last year, it did not seem to matter that the United States and its allies
had no clear strategy for dealing with isis' provinces. Neither Wash-
ington nor its friends were eager to take on yet another messy fight in
the Middle East. Indeed, targeting the provinces appeared counter-
productive: if the groups were locally focused, then bombing them
might just provoke them to attack the West. Yet the attack on the
Russian plane exposed the danger of this line of thinking. Ignoring the
provinces risks allowing isis to grow stronger and more dangerous.
Any strategy aimed at weakening the provinces must include two parts:
severing the link between the core group and the affiliates and attempt-
ing to contain, weaken, and defeat the affiliates themselves. To that end,
the United States and its allies should target provincial command-and-
control centers and locals who have personal relationships with top isis
leaders in Iraq and Syria. Deprived of instruction from headquarters, the
provinces will be forced to go their own way, which could create a world
of new problems for isis' core, costing them local allies.
To fight isis as it spreads, the United States will need military
bases in many remote parts of the world. Flexibility will be vital, since
it is hard to predict which provinces will expand and demand the

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 ISIS Goes Global

most attention. (Yemen, for example, was not a major concern for
U.S. counterterrorism officials until 2009, when the so-called under-
wear bomber, who had been based there, nearly downed an airplane
over Detroit.) To gain the right geographic reach and to ease the burden,
the United States should also work with its allies. France, for instance,
is committed to the anti-isis coalition and has a strong military presence
in North Africa. The United States should divvy up responsibilities
and coordinate operations with France there.
The United States and its allies should also seek to weaken the prov-
inces by portraying the core group as out of touch with local grievances
in the news and on social media. This tactic is more likely to work in
countries where anti-foreign sentiment is particularly strong, such as
Somalia, than in places where national identity is weaker, such as Libya.
Washington also needs to strengthen the states where isis affili-
ates have set up shop. It should provide aid and training to military,
police, and intelligence forces in such places. It should also offer to
help these countries improve their administrative capacity through
judicial reform and social service provision and assist them in securing
their borders by building barriers, improving surveillance, and train-
ing border troops. In countries without a functioning government,
such as Libya, the United States may have to work with local militias
and tribes.
Diasporas that are involved in civil wars in their homelands, such
as the Somali diaspora, are also a counterterrorist concern. Until now,
such struggles have been primarily local, and so if a member of the
diaspora felt compelled to take up arms, he often posed little threat to
his host country. If groups such as al Shabab embrace isis, however,
the threat may grow. But diasporas can also provide an opportunity,
since it is far easier to gather intelligence from the members of a diaspora
community than from their brethren back home. In many cases, the
best way to gain leads is to work with the communities themselves;
the less they feel alienated, the more likely they will be to report any
troublemakers in their midst.
In all these ways, Washington must integrate isis' many provinces
into the overall U.S. strategy against the group. Left unchecked, these
regional affiliates will increasingly threaten the Middle East and the
rest of the world. But with the right policies, the United States and its
allies can do serious damage to both the provinces and their masters,
turning a mutually beneficial relationship into a disaster for both.®

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