ISIS Scatters to the Four Winds... And to Central Asia

http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Seventeen-die-in-Islamic-State-attack-on-border-checkpoint-48474.html

This has long been the fear, that in the aftermath of its Syrian defeat and the death of its leader, the surviving elements of ISIS would return to their home countries and bring their violent forms of Salafism with them. Al Qaeda it would seem is on the wane and the more extreme, apocalyptic and (despite its attempted caliphate) even de-centralised forms of Salafi violence represented by ISIS are growing in popularity. The same frustrations that are driving people on to the streets across much of the world are in the Islamic context driving some youth into radicalism.

Western media has at times focused on the diffusionary aspect of the story but only within in a Western context or in the context of its allies. The dispersal of ISIS and its effects on Central Asia, the Caucasus and Russia itself have been conveniently ignored. For example with regard to Chechnya, the West frequently smears Ramzan Kadyrov, Moscow's puppet ruler, but the larger story regarding the tiny nation is ignored, not to mention the large Chechen diasporas in Turkey and Syria.

When Turkey was under NATO's thumb in the 1990's the Chechen insurgents and paramilitaries who were waging war against Moscow were supported out of Georgia and were able to move about openly within Turkey... obviously supported by NATO interests.

While the Kadyrov regime has turned Chechnya into a fairly brutal authoritarian state the fighting goes on in the forests and mountains and Moscow has long feared that radicalised ISIS fighters have the potential to rekindle the larger conflict. And they know that in such a context, Washington (via proxies of course) would be happy to support them. The same was true with al Qaeda.

Central Asia remains a place of tension and it certainly had its share of Salafi violence in the 1990's and in the aftermath of 9/11. But it's also Ground Zero in a larger geopolitical struggle between nations such as Russia, the United States, China, India, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Turkey and even the EU. There has long been a fear of ISIS fighters returning to the various 'Stan' nations in Central Asia. Indeed the fight is already fairly intense in Afghanistan as the ISIS ideology is in conflict with the Deobandi-Pashtun Islamism of the Taliban.

It was clear that during the Syrian War the United States and its allies were happy at times to use both al Qaeda and ISIS in different contexts to combat the Assad regime. Vocal support was given, there is evidence of logistical and tactical support and at times it would seem military aid was provided, through indirect means of course. There is also a fairly impressive amount of direct and circumstantial evidence pointing to Western intelligence agencies running networks of weapons smuggling and fighters within and out of the Islamic diaspora communities within Europe itself.

ISIS fighters were allowed to escape both Mosul and Raqqa as the US continued to utilise them in the fight against Damascus. The final elimination of Abu Bakr al Baghdadi strikes one as anticlimactic and somewhat farcical, reminiscent of the 2011 bin Laden raid. A chapter was being closed and indeed just as the War on Terror itself shifted in 2011, Washington began a new phase of aggression culminating in the Syrian, Libyan and Yemeni Wars as well as a new series of conflicts within Africa. The new phase in the endless war has been identified by the Pentagon as 'Great Power Conflicts'... or more rightly Cold War II. The enemies are no longer primarily al Qaeda or ISIS but 'revisionist' powers such as Russia and China.

The Islamist/Terrorist narrative has faded and been relegated to a second-tier question. The 'end' of the War on Terror will not be announced because it remains a necessary tool to justify the volumes of transformative legislation passed after 9/11 and it remains a convenient tool to scare and manipulate the masses.

So what of the remnants of ISIS? These are personae non gratae, and as such must either continue the fight as Islamist paramilitaries or put their services and skills out for hire. Their only other hope is to shed their identities and go underground, but their faces are known and in this high-tech age of surveillance, it's not as easy as it once was.

And this is what comes to mind as I read this story about an attack on the Tajik-Uzbek border.... an attack seemingly timed to correspond with Tajik president Rakhmon's absence as well as an agreement designed to pacify the border between the two Central Asian rivals who continue to clash over borders, resources and unresolved historical and cultural questions.

Who benefits from the breakdown in relations? That's complicated and undoubtedly the answer is multi-faceted. But the region has remained tense since the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the various nations have shifted alliances even while attempting to maintain a modicum of autonomy.  For many years Uzbekistan was a little less friendly toward Washington as they looked suspiciously at Washington's motives and its utilisation of NGO's, energy companies, finance and its military activities. While Dushanbe leaned toward Washington, Tashkent was more oriented in the direction of Moscow.

And yet with the death of Uzbek president Islam Karimov in 2016, and the ascendancy of Shavkat Mirziyoyev relations have warmed a bit as indicated by a White House visit with Donald Trump in 2018.*

There are those who do not want to see this relationship flourish and thus it would hardly be surprising to find that ISIS fighters were put up to the task.

This is another aspect to the post-ISIS scenario that few have entertained. Are they dyed-in-the-wool Salafi militants? Undoubtedly some of them are. Some are both true-believer militants and assets that are willing to be bought and utilised by the highest bidder. Understand that the agents making contact, negotiating missions and giving them weapons are not always who they purport to be. ISIS undoubtedly has its own intelligence networks and yet they may not always know just who is hiring them.

There are both cells and individuals who have and will continue to effectively function as mercenaries. Fighting a guerilla war requires money and weapons and a study of such groups reveals that they often will spend more of their time pursuing these practical and operational needs then doing the actual fighting for the 'cause' as it were. In other words they get sidetracked. One is reminded of the various underground paramilitary groups in the West that are perhaps more famous for their bank robberies than their political actions. Of course they also cast their bank robberies in a political light and indeed Islamists are able to do the same. Such is the ethics of war.

So are these dispersed ISIS fighters mercenaries? State assets? Salafi terrorists?

Well the truth is they are (and have the potential to be) all of the above. This only further complicates geopolitical questions and you can be sure the news media will do nothing to shed light on these issues. Instead they will manipulate them and use them as a means of ratcheting up political pressure and will also utilise these incidents as tools of fear.

This ISIS attack looks (to me) as a move directed against the US agenda in Uzbekistan and one in keeping with the goals of other players. That itself marks a change as ISIS has been largely (but not exclusively) a tool of US interests in the Middle East. The fragmentation of ISIS seems to be producing a fragmented policy and one must wonder how proper it is to even speak of ISIS as a unified movement any more. How many cells now function as sometime fighters... and sometime mercenaries?

It's hard to say. This attack serves the interests of some disenfranchised factions within the Uzbek elite. It also serves the interests of both Moscow and Beijing. Just who is behind it... I doubt we'll ever know but one thing is clear. The attack cannot be connected in any sort of viable or credible way to the ISIS agenda. I suppose some could argue for some kind of chaos doctrine but it seems too targeted for that. It would seem the political violence of ISIS is expanding its horizons and I would argue it is not chaotic at all but is a tool being manipulated and used by others... apparently on both sides of the larger global conflict.

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*There is the additional scandal surrounding Gulnara Karimova, daughter of the deceased president. She was seen as being groomed to be his successor and yet a falling out with him and (it would seem) rival forces maneuvered to keep her out of favour up to the time of her father's death. Deeply entrenched in the state apparatus and its corruption she has (it seems) been hung out to dry. Placed under house arrest by the new Mirziyoyev regime, Gulnara has fallen from power and her life is certainly in danger.

Palace intrigues are nothing new but what's interesting to note is that the Karimovs were certainly more inclined to Moscow and Beijing than Washington. The Mirziyoyev administration seems to be tilting toward Washington and US authorities have given the Mirziyoyev government a boost in putting the Karimov family and its assets under sanction and the Justice Department (under the outrageous premise of the KAR Initiative) has ceased millions in assets... monies tied in many cases to Moscow.