[color=#000099][/color]Former US Defense Secretary Robert Gates,
the only person who held that position under
two presidents for two different political
parties, sat down with Business Insider this
week and described what he sees as the two
main factors that allowed ISIS to rise in the
Middle East.
Gates, who is promoting his new book, "A
Passion for Leadership," gave his take on US
policy in the Middle East.
He said the Syrian civil war and the policies of
Iraq's former prime minister, Nouri al-Maliki,
contributed to the terrorist group flourishing in
the region more so than the 2003 US invasion
of Iraq or eventual troop drawdown.
"I think the primary reasons for the rise of ISIS
are the Syrian civil war and the policies
followed by the government in Baghdad,"
Gates told Business Insider on Monday.
Even before civil war broke out in Syria in
2011, the regime of President Bashar al-Assad
allowed "rat lines" of jihadis to travel back and
forth across the country's border with Iraq,
fueling the Iraqi insurgency that eventually
turned into ISIS (also known as the Islamic
State, ISIL, or Daesh).
As Michael Weiss and Hassan Hassan explained
in their recent book, "ISIS: Inside the Army of
Terror," Syrian authorities reportedly knew
about the cross-border flow of jhadis, but did
nothing to stop it. And even when the Assad
regime did step in and try to make it appear as
though it was working to stop extremists from
moving between Syria and Iraq, the effort was
"eclipsed by rampant corruption" as Syrian
authorities took bribes to allow Syrians to cross
the border.
While the Assad regime was neglecting to stop
the stream of jihadists from Syria into Iraq,
Maliki was implementing sectarian policies in
Iraq that further divided the population,
making jihadist groups seem more appealing to
some.
But the US still did perhaps play a role in the
burgeoning conflict as well, Gates suggested.
"You can argue all day long whether the
absence of US forces had an impact on" the rise
of ISIS, Gates said, admitting that "the absence
of senior leadership that was able to mitigate
some of the sectarian conflicts in Iraq probably
had some impact on the willingness of Maliki to
follow these wrong policies."
Gates explained that Maliki's sectarian policies,
which often benefited Shiites at the expense of
Sunnis, made it easier for Al Qaeda in Iraq, the
predecessor to ISIS, to recruit. ISIS is a Sunni
terror group and bills itself as a great protector
during a time when disaffected Sunnis feel like
they can't trust the Shia-dominated Iraqi
government.
Maliki's "policies were so negative toward the
Sunnis in Iraq that I think many Sunnis believed
that ISIS would be better for them than the
government in Baghdad," Gates said. "They’ve
learned, to their sorrow, that that’s not true,
but Maliki gave the Sunnis in Iraq no reason to
resist ISIS because he was so anti-Sunni."

And while the US certainly didn't encourage
these policies, the determination to end the
war in Iraq and pull US troops out meant that
the country had much less of a US presence on
the ground at a time when Americans could
have been useful in mediating these conflicts,
Gates said.
"Where I think our presence mattered was
when we had senior military officers in
Baghdad, they were able to get the leaders of
Baghdad from all of the different groups
together, Sunnis, Shia, Kurds, and mediate
some of these disputes and minimize some of
the negative policies that were being followed
by Maliki," Gates said.
The US leaving may have further emboldened
Maliki to continue his anti-Sunni policies.
"When we left, most of the leaders of the Iraqi
Security Forces were people we’d had a hand in
training, and in some cases selecting, and they
were pretty capable people," Gates said,
referring to the Iraqi army that US forces
helped train and build up.
"Well, Maliki replaced all of those people with a
bunch of political hacks who were incompetent
and corrupt and no Iraqi soldier was going to
fight for them, as we saw in Mosul."
Sectarian divisions in Iraq have made it more
difficult for the country to foster a sense of
national unity that would inspire people from
different backgrounds to come together and
fight for the future of the country. In Mosul,
Iraqi forces abandoned their posts as ISIS
forces advanced on the city. The militants still
control Mosul to this day.
www.businessinsider.com/robert-gates-isis-rise-2016-1

the pix looks like Donald Trump brother