The Islamic State is a transnational Sunni Islamist insurgent and terrorist group that has expanded its control over areas of parts of Iraq and Syria since 2013. It threatens the governments of both countries and potentially several other countries in the region, and has drawn increased attention from the international community. There is debate over the degree to which the Islamic State organization might represent a direct terrorist threat to the U.S. homeland or to U.S. facilities and personnel in the region. The ...
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The Islamic State is a transnational Sunni Islamist insurgent and terrorist group that has expanded its control over areas of parts of Iraq and Syria since 2013. It threatens the governments of both countries and potentially several other countries in the region, and has drawn increased attention from the international community. There is debate over the degree to which the Islamic State organization might represent a direct terrorist threat to the U.S. homeland or to U.S. facilities and personnel in the region. The forerunner of the Islamic State (IS) was part of the insurgency against coalition forces in Iraq, and the organization has in the years since the 2011 U.S. withdrawal from Iraq expanded its control over significant areas of both Iraq and Syria. The Islamic State has thrived in the disaffected Sunni tribal areas of Iraq and in the remote provinces of Syria torn by the civil war. Since early 2014, Islamic State-led forces, supported by Sunni Arab tribalists and groups linked to ousted Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, have advanced along the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, seizing multiple population centers including Mosul, one of Iraq's largest cities. Since then, IS forces have massacred Syrian adversaries and Iraqi civilians, often from ethnic or religious minorities, and recently executed two American journalists who the group had captured while they were working in Syria. As of October 2014, Islamic State fighters also have come close to capturing a key Kurdish enclave in northern Syria. The Islamic State's tactics have drawn the ire of the international community, increasing U.S. attention on Iraq's political problems and on the civil war in Syria. On September 10, President Obama announced a series of actions intended to "degrade, and ultimately destroy" the Islamic State organization. The United States is leading and seeking to expand a multilateral coalition that is undertaking direct military action, providing advice, training and equipment for partner ground forces in Iraq and Syria, gathering and sharing intelligence, and using financial measures against the Islamic State. The objective of these measures is to progressively shrink the geographic and political space, manpower, and financial resources available to the organization. At the same time, the U.S. effort to show progress against the Islamic State, and the recruitment of regional partners, raises questions of whether the U.S. mission and commitment might expand. The Administration has ruled out deploying combat forces to either Iraq or Syria, but it has not necessarily ruled out providing forward aircraft controllers, additional military advisors, or other related ground military assets. Some experts assert that coalition partners inside Iraq and Syria- Iraqi government forces and select Syrian opposition groups-are too weak to defeat the Islamic State and will eventually require help from U.S. combat troops. Several of the regional coalition members apparently seek an expansion of the U.S.-led mission to include an effort to oust President Bashar al Asad of Syria, arguing that the Islamic State cannot be defeated until the Syrian political situation is altered. For details on Islamic State operations in Iraq and U.S. policy toward Iraq since the 2003 U.S. invasion, see CRS Report RS21968, Iraq: Politics, Governance, and Human Rights, by Kenneth Katzman. For further information on the Islamic State's operations in Syria, see CRS Report RL33487, Armed Conflict in Syria: Overview and U.S. Response, coordinated by Christopher M. Blanchard.
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