The U.S. Needs to Rethink Its Anti-ISIS Approach in Syria | TIME - 0 views
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As a result, morale among nationalist fighters in northern Syria has plummeted
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ISIS remains essentially unchallenged in its heartland in northern Syria, despite repeated U.S. air strikes
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In the south, nationalists have fared better at keeping ISIS out and Jabhat al Nusra in check, partly due to a coherent, rational U.S.-led support program operating covertly out of Jordan
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A strategy to beat the jihadists and make sure they stay beaten must be locally-driven, led by nationalist forces supported by the Sunni population that forms the insurgency’s social base.
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The U.S.-led air campaign against the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) has scored some points in Syria, weakening ISIS’s oil infrastructure and revenues and keeping the group out of Kobane
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the promised U.S. train-and-equip program is unlikely to reverse the nationalists’ losses or jihadists’ gains in northern Syria
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air strikes alone, and treating nationalist groups as agents rather than partners, violates this principle
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, the U.S. has helped nationalists in the south avoid the fragmentation, infighting, and lawlessness that weakened them and benefited the jihadists in northern Syria
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ISIS offers conquered populations the choice between submission – which brings a sense of order and some protection from regime violence – or futile resistance and death
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Jabhat al Nusra has driven nationalist forces out of much of their core territory in northern Syria, and ISIS continues to threaten those that remain
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Even if the coalition wants to avoid confronting regime forces, it can and should concentrate air strikes closer to ISIS’s front lines with the nationalist insurgency, helping the latter block ISIS advances in cooperation with local Kurdish forces when possible
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, U.S. interests would be better served by a two-pronged approach in northern and southern Syria, helping nationalist rebels contain ISIS and compete with Jabhat al Nusra for control of the insurgency.
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U.S. airstrikes on jihadists have spared the regime’s forces and inadvertently killed Syrian civilians
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that Sunni Muslims are under siege by oppressive regional minorities, Iran, and even the United States itself
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Ironically, the coalition campaign has contributed to the near-collapse of nationalist forces in northern Syria who, despite their imperfections, were ISIS’s most effective rivals and competed with Jabhat al Nusra for leadership of the insurgency
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campaign has had serious local side effects that have undermined the broader, long-term objective of degrading and destroying ISIS in Syria and preventing the Al Qaeda affiliate, Jabhat al Nusra, from replacing or thriving alongside ISIS