The Best Strategy to Handle ISIS: Good Old Containment by Dov S. Zakheim, The National Interest
The Obama administration claims that it has a strategy to defeat ISIS. It does not. The forces of this most radical of Islamist groups continue to grow, even as it becomes increasingly entrenched in the large swath of Iraqi and Syrian territory that it now governs. It can survive bombings—so did the Vietnamese in their war with the United States - and it faces no serious threat on the ground.
There is little point in training the Iraqi army to defeat ISIS. A decade of intensive American and Western training did not yield a real fighting force. The Iraqi Army proved to be a sham. It showed its true colors when its commanders absconded as soon as they confronted the ISIS forces, while its men tore off their uniforms and left their equipment behind for ISIS to scoop up…