DISARM
ISIS:
CAPTURE
OR KILL ALL JIHADIS
SYNOPSIS:
If the World Peace Force had been operating
in 2016, 2017, 2018,
the most obvious 'nation' to disarm would have been ISIS
—the
self-named "Islamic State of Iraq and Syria".
The one million men and women of the World Peace
Force
would quickly have overwhelmed the 30,000 Jihadis fighting for
ISIS.
If something like ISIS emerges once again,
and if there is still no World Peace Force,
the civilized nations of the planet Earth
could form a United Army for
Disarmament,
which could follow the obvious steps needed
to capture or kill all members of the murder-suicide cult.
OUTLINE:
1.
GROUND WARFARE ALLOWING MANY JIHADIS TO SURRENDER.
2.
SOME JIHADIS CAN BE REHABILITATED.
3.
DISARMING ALL SIDES IN SYRIA.
4.
DISARMING IRAQ.
5.
AFTER PEACE PREVAILS,
SOME FORMER
JIHADIS CAN RE-JOIN SOCIETY.
DISARM
ISIS:
CAPTURE
OR KILL ALL JIHADIS
by
James Leonard Park
1. GROUND WARFARE ALLOWING
MANY JIHADIS TO SURRENDER.
Instead of trying to push back ISIS fighters,
which might be appropriate when fighting a nation-state,
the individual soldiers of ISIS should be captured or
killed.
Some fighters are so deeply committed to their
ideology
that they genuinely will prefer to die in battle
rather than surrender or be
captured.
But even some of these fighters might reconsider
when they see that surrendering
fighters are treated well.
Because of the failure of all military efforts to
stabilize Iraq,
the United States and its allies are wisely reluctant
to apply the same tactics in Syria and northern Iraq:
Trying to destroy one side
in a civil war by building up another
results in more ethnic hatred and continued killing.
And when there are several warring militias,
the situation is too complicated to be sorted out by foreign
troops.
Rather, the United Army for Disarmament (UAD)
could begin to actualize the philosophy of the World Peace Force:
Disarm and demobilize all
fighters
—even
those employed by governments.
Once one million well-armed peace-keepers
have been assembled in nearby cooperating countries
(and even within
areas of countries where cults have taken power),
then the peace-keepers should move slowly and carefully
over all of the land areas controlled by the cult.
In each kilometer of their advance,
they should accept the surrenders of any former fighters.
Jihadis taken into custody should be carefully protected
from their former commanders
and from any Jihadis who falsely surrender in order to kill
their former comrades-in-arms for betraying the cause.
Even before much capturing and surrendering takes
place,
the United Army for Disarmament should establish prison-camps
for everyone who surrenders or is captured.
These should be well publicized and photographed,
so that fighters can imagine themselves going to these
camps
instead of continuing to fight for a losing cause.
Fighters should be convinced that ISIS cannot
take over
the world
by the fact that one million of the soldiers from the rest of the world
have come to the Middle East to disarm them.
And many of these peace-keepers would be Muslims.
Capture and surrender should become
the preferred mode of
operation for the UAD.
This will be in stark contrast to the former futile efforts,
which mostly consisted of attacking ISIS locations from high in the
air.
Even fighters who would not choose to die for the Jihadist cause
have no opportunity to surrender when attacked by Hellfire missiles.
But a slowly-advancing army of peace-keepers,
constantly offering convenient and safe ways to surrender,
will probably gather thousands
of Jihadis who would otherwise die in
combat.
About half of the Jihadis once fighting in Syria and
Iraq
were not originally from either of those two countries.
When captured, they should be returned to their homelands
—as
long as those countries have already established secure prisons
for former Jihadis who agree to surrender rather than die.
As the news spreads that surrendering Jihadis are
treated well,
more of the marginal fighters will consider that option.
When the active warfare is finished,
more cult-members might be in prisons
and prison-camps
than in
graves.
This is the stark choice facing all fighters:
SURRENDER or DIE.
Accept either a bed in a
prison-camp or a grave
in the ground.
2. SOME JIHADIS CAN BE
REHABILITATED.
When we in the United States consider who the
American Jihadis are,
we are more sympathetic toward them and their families.
We definitely prefer that they be captured or that they surrender
rather than losing their lives fighting Jihad in a foreign land.
The death penalty is probably not appropriate for
young Muslims
who were temporarily attracted by a violent terrorist religious cult.
Rather, compassionate prisons will help them to be de-radicalized.
Once prisons are established in the USA for returned
Jihadis,
some of their stories will be told by journalists.
Often, we will discover, they were young when they 'decided' to
join Jihad.
Some were attracted to
warfare for all the wrong reasons.
And after they saw what was actually happening on the battlefield,
they decided to return to their homelands.
Fighting against the 'enemies of God'
turned out to be shooting other young fighters
who happened to belong to the 'wrong' ethnic group
or who were commanded by a different warlord.
Moreover, most of them were other Muslims.
More dedicated Jihadis might require a long time to
be
rehabilitated.
If they have swallowed the belief-system of ISIS,
it might take even a few years to be converted to main-stream Islam.
And the best prisons for former Jihadis
will have a major place for peaceful Muslims
to re-educate misled Jihadis into the peaceful pathways of Islam.
Prisons created to save Jihadis from
self-destruction
will have to develop meaningful ways to measure the rehabilitation
of young men who previously believed that the meaning of their lives
was to kill other people for having the wrong beliefs.
And these diverse prison systems can learn from one
another.
Which systems have the best success in turning Jihadis toward peace?
And which systems have mostly failed
—because
their former inmates once released rejoined Jihad.
In Muslim countries, there will be debates
among the Muslim leaders
about which beliefs represent true
Islam and which
beliefs are outside the pale.
And the prisons for Jihadis in Muslim countries
might also be used for domestic
terrorists
—who
have committed criminal acts according to that country's laws.
Which Jihadis can have their minds changed?
Which misled Muslims will recover from their cult-beliefs?
And which Jihadis will have to spend the rest of their lives
behind bars
because they keep their violent beliefs
---and releasing them would be too dangerous for the rest of the world?
The civilized world will show greater compassion
than the Jihadis
not by using military methods to kill as many Jihadis as possible
but by establishing thoughtful prison-systems
designed to help misguided Muslims
to recover from the Jihadist
phase of their lives.
3. DISARMING ALL SIDES IN
SYRIA.
When U.S. airplanes and drones targeted ISIS
positions in Syria,
they were also helping support the government of Syria,
since the Syrian armed forces are also fighting against ISIS.
But we do not want to support the military
dictatorship of Syria,
which has already killed
hundreds of thousands of Syrians
simply because they lived in areas of the country
that did not generally support the central government.
However, the philosophy
of the World Peace Force
—disarm all fighters—
fits the Syrian situation almost perfectly.
Peace-keepers should not support any fighting factions
—including
the military forces of the government in Damascus.
Peace-keepers do not need to identify 'moderate rebel fighters'.
The United Army for Disarmament will not support the least
worst army.
Rather, peace-keeping means disarming
everyone who has a gun.
How could outsiders decide which private army to support?
And what will happen years from now,
when the political and military structure will be completely different?
The arms the U.S. provided to the military forces of Iraq
have fallen into the hands of ISIS.
What prevents that from happening again and again,
if the U.S. decides to send arms into a chaotic war-zone?
The opposite tactic is: Never send weapons into
warfare.
Instead, very responsible troops
(who have proven their abilities in
other wars)
should slowly take over the whole land of the Syrian Arab Republic,
disarming everyone who has
any weapon of warfare,
no matter what political or religious philosophy they
might espouse.
And this explicitly includes
the organized armed forces of Syria.
Then for the foreseeable future, the United Army for
Disarmament
will maintain all necessary peace-keepers to prevent any further
killing.
A central government based on military force will no longer be possible.
Whatever new systems of public order emerge after disarmament
will be based on the consent
of the governed.
The peace-loving people of Syria
will establish new ways to govern themselves.
The millions of Syrians internally displaced
and gone into refugee camps in neighboring countries
will be able to return to re-build their lives,
now completely free of any
people with guns telling them what to do.
Civil war will be over.
The old military dictatorship will be gone.
And all former fighters for
any side will either be in prisons or in
graves.
And eventually some of the former fighters in prisons
will be rehabilitated enough to follow non-violent ways of life.
4. DISARMING IRAQ.
There will not be such unanimous agreement about
what to do with Iraq.
But the 10-year effort to
make a new Iraq along Western lines did not
work.
Every day in Iraq, there are more killings in their ethnic strife.
And the army of Iraq was not able to prevent ISIS
from taking over the second largest city—Mosul.
Even tho Iraq had 30 'trained' soldiers for every ISIS fighter,
they all ran away when ISIS
came to town.
Complete disarmament for Iraq also means that
there will no longer be any military forces controlled by any
government.
Local police forces (without any military capacities) will handle local
crimes.
But the soldiers of the United Army for Disarmament
will handle all issues formerly handled by the Iraq
military.
When local governments establish themselves,
they might decide that the ethnic divisions of Iraq are too deep
for them to have a united country.
So—at
least temporarily—Iraq
might sub-divide along
ethnic lines.
But the tribalism necessary when everyone was
struggling for supremacy
can diminish when military
force will no longer be the basis of
government.
Former fighters for any private army or for the
central government
will all be in prison-camps until reasonable decisions can be
made.
As a new non-military Iraq emerges, these former soldiers can be
released
—as
long as everyone can be certain they will not take up arms
once again
to support whatever ethnic group or cause they previously supported.
Both Iraq and Syria will emerge as the two newest
non-military states.
This will require major adjustments in the thinking of former fighters.
But the women and children will be happy peace has come to their
lands.
The non-military citizens of these countries can resume their everyday
lives,
peacefully pursuing whatever is meaningful to them,
without any further threats
from any men with guns.
5. AFTER PEACE PREVAILS,
SOME FORMER
JIHADIS CAN RE-JOIN SOCIETY.
Once everyone is convinced that permanent peace has
been achieved,
protected by the United Army for Disarmament or the World Peace Force,
then former fighters for any organized group
can be gradually released into the community,
beginning with those who are the least likely to take up
arms once
again.
All former fighters will be 'on parole',
monitored by all peace-loving people of their own families and
communities,
so that any remaining military inclinations will be noticed.
Those who behave in any ways that suggest re-armament
will be put back into prison by the peace-keepers.
And some former fighters will be so identified with
their military selves
that they will never be released into the community.
If they cannot be reformed—able
to take up some peaceful way of life—
they will have to be kept in prison for the rest of their
lives.
Year by year, their number will dwindle,
both as the result of natural deaths
and as the result of seeing their countries at peace.
Some decades from now, it will be clear to everyone
on Earth
that the Jihadis did not take over the whole planet.
Rather, it was a sad phase of world history
that lasted so-and-so many years.
And all Jihadis who did not die in the struggles
will be able to create new lives for themselves.
New, non-military law-and-order will emerge,
created by the peace-loving peoples of all ethnic groups.
And the United Army for Disarmament or the World Peace Force
will protect everyone from military violence from any quarter.
AUTHOR:
James Leonard Park is an independent thinker,
not associated with any of the factions in the Middle East.
These principles of universal disarmament can apply
to many other military and para-military conflicts on the Earth.
The most permanent solution will be the World Peace Force,
which is discussed in much greater detail in:
World
Peace Force:
Disarming the Planet Earth.
Another book deals specifically with Iraq:
Iraq:
Mutual
Genocide.
Its several chapters explain how Iraq got to its present situation
and how complete disarmament might be the best long-term solution.
Created
December 6, 2014; Revised 12-11-2014; 12-16-2014; 12-17-2014;
12-24-2014; 12-27-2014; 12-28-2014;
1-6-2015; 1-24-2015; 2-27-2015; 2-28-2015; 3-11-2015; 7-16-2015;
11-20-2015;
4-27-2016; 10-17-2016; 4-11-2019; 12-16-2020;
This
essay "Disarming ISIS: Capturing or Killing All Jihadis"
has
now been collected with some other chapters on Iraq to create this
book:
Iraq:
Mutual Genocide.