In a little over a year the extremist forces of ISIS grew from scattered bands of former Baathists, Saddam diehards, former prisoners, unemployed military officers and radicalized youth into a force that is systematically taking apart what little good the United States did in eight years of fruitless war in Iraq. They now have control over large areas of Iraq and neighboring Syria.
One of the cities now living under the black flag of ISIS is Fallujah where, ten years ago this month, United States Marines fought one of the bloodiest and brutal battles of the Cheny-Bush war against Iraq. (Link to NPR story on the anniversary of the battle, here.)
While the roots of this extremist band reach back through centuries of religious sectarian suspicion, betrayal and bloodshed, the bumbling of the Obama administration and their truly Bush level miscalculation and intelligence snafus provided the space for this fire to take place. When it comes to foreign policy, both the Democrats and Republicans are masters of making a bad situation much, much worse. That, I suppose is the logical outcome of an empire governed for the benefits of oil companies and other corporations and not people and justice.
To gain some perspective and context to a truly insane situation that is dragging us back to the Middle East this show is a good overview.
