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clear that it was focusing exclusively on the fight against ISIL.8 This exemplifies the
difficulties facing the US when it comes to accommodating the interests of all its partners.
War and its own grammar
In addition to these difficulties, the US has to cope with its potential local partners. So far only
theKurdish forces have demonstrated crediblemilitary strength. InSyria, their forces pushed ISIL
out of Kobane after weeks of bloody urban combat. In Iraq, the Peshmerga fighters also protected
the city of Kirkuk against a surprise offensive. However, the Kurdish military performance comes
at a price: by January 2015, it was estimated that 1,000 men had been killed in the fights.9
But the effectiveness of other partners is more problematic. The Iraqi armed forces
remain poorly trained, lacking in motivation, and torn by sectarian rivalries. They have
proved unable to deliver, as witnessed by the major debacle of June 2014 in Mosul. In
response, in the late summer of 2014 the US sent an initial force of 1,500 non-combatant
soldiers to train and advise Iraqi forces. In November 2014, the White House sent a new
request calling for additional 1,600 advisers, amounting to US $ 1.618 billion. The major
test may come with the planned offensive to retake Mosul in the spring of 2015. According
to information released by the Department of Defense, the plan would include five Iraqi
Army Brigades (about 10,000 troops) in conjunction with Kurdish Peshmerga.10
With regard to the so-called “vetted” Syrian rebels trained by the CIA in Jordan, results
have again been inconclusive. They lost some battles against factions like Jabhat al Nusra
and, in other cases, merely sided with those they were supposed to fight against.11 These
resulting uncertainties surrounding the fight on the ground raise another issue: the strategic
significance of US airstrikes.
Airstrikes have been part of the operation named Inherent Resolve, conducted by the
US Central Command since 8 August 2014. They target ISIL leadership, military sites
and economic infrastructure. As of 30 January 2015, the cost of the operation was US $ 1.5
billion, with an average daily cost of $ 8.4 million.12
If we look more specifically at the selection of targets, they are more or less equally
distributed in Iraq and Syria. In the latter case, 70% of the strikes have focused on the
Kurdish city of Kobane, which came under siege by ISIL in September 2014. According
to US sources, these strikes killed as many as 1,000 ISIL fighters in the surroundings of
Kobane, leading some journalists to query their effectiveness. The magazine Mother Jones
stated ironically that “almost 600 airstrikes killed around 1,000 ISIS fighters in Kobani:
That’s less than one strike per TWO PEOPLE”.13
8 Idiz S (2015). Questions remain over Turkey’s training of Syrian opposition. Al Monitor, 24 February 2015.
9 Caryl C (2015). Want to hurt the Islamic State? Here’s how. Foreign Policy , 6 February 2015.
10 Gordon M, Schmitt E (2015). Mosul battle will be test of US plan against ISIS. New York Times, 23
February 2015.
11 Stein J (2014). Inside the CIA’s Syrian Rebels Vetting Machine. Newsweek, 10 November 2014.
12 US Department of Defense. Operation inherent resolve: targeted operations against ISIL terrorists.
Available in:
13 McLaughlin J (2015). Most US airstrikes in Syria target a city that’s not a “strategic objective”. Mother
Jones, 23 January 2015. Available in:
kobani-statistics-operation-inherent-resolve.