# ISIS in the Middle East is growing **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 10, 2014, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473 "2014-06-10T14:45:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![tagos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@tagos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tagos)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/61 "2014-06-13T15:19:27Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Iraq is a lot like Yugoslavia: A multinational state cobbled together out of former Ottoman provinces after WWI, with a lot of unresolved ethnic and religious hatreds that only a strongman government could hold down. When the lid was ripped off, the pot boiled over. Which was all known beforehand. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/62 "2014-06-13T15:34:23Z")
> [@tagos](#): > > Which was all known beforehand. Known intellectually, maybe, by some people. Not believed by those making the decisions. Hubris is a bitch. ---
**Author:** ![Steken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Steken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steken)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/63 "2014-06-13T16:10:32Z")
A question about partition, more relevant here than in [that other thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?p=17459446#post17459446), and relating to the Yugoslavia thing: OK, [so we know that a vast majority of the Iraqi Kurds want independence](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraqi_Kurdistan_independence_referendum,_2005), but what about the Sunni Arabs and the Shi’ite Arabs? Is there support for partition amongst those folk, too? (I realize that most major cities - Baghdad included - have mixed Sunni/Shia populations, and that partition would, in any case, be a very messy affair indeed. The question isn’t if partition would be a good idea, but if there’s strong popular support for it amongst the Arabs, too.) ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/64 "2014-06-13T18:37:30Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > [They did both, what part of terrorist organisation don’t you understand?](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1964_Brinks_Hotel_bombing) Do you not even read your own cites? The first paragraph: > [@](#): > > The Brink Hotel in Saigon, also known as the Brink Bachelor Officers Quarters (BOQ), was bombed by the Viet Cong on the evening of December 24, 1964, during the Vietnam War. Two Viet Cong operatives detonated a car bomb underneath the hotel, which housed United States Army officers. The explosion killed two Americans, an officer and an NCO, and injured approximately 60, including military personnel and Vietnamese civilians. If this is how you choose to define ‘terrorist organization’, then you have widened the term to have no meaning. The US Air Force is a terrorist organization by that definition. So is every military that has ever existed. > [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > Because the battle tactics itself are not as significant as the eye-raising spectre of the ARVN being utterly incapable of mounting an effective offensive or defence, a force which was heavily trained and supplied by the US, much like the Iraqi army in recent events. 😕 This is just rediculous. The battle tactics themselves were what the ARVN was supposed to have been trained, supplied and equipped to do. That it was incapable of doing so, with US advisors, in a conventional battle was the whole point. It is simply absurd for you to claim that Ap Bac being a conventional battle was not significant when it was, in fact, the entire point. It was the type of battle that the ARVN was supposed to be able to win against the Viet Cong, which is why the VC had avoided engaging in pitched battle with the ARVN. That they deliberately presented themselves for battle with the ARVN, fought them in conventional battle and won was the whole point of Ap Bac. > [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > Why is it so hard for you to appreciate the fact that the Iraqi Army has ceased to be an effective fighting force due to American incompetence in the beginning of 2003 Because 1) it has never been an effective fighting force before 2003 to begin with and 2) the current year is 2014. > [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > [Republican Guard (Iraq) - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Guard_%28Iraq%29) > > So they were above the ordinary foot soldiers in the Iraqi army, which is to be expected, but they were within the Military structure. They constituted **a part of the Iraqi Army**. Now you’re just being deliberately obtuse. Read your own quote “The Republican Guard were the elite troops of the Iraqi army **directly reporting to Saddam Hussein** ”; they did not report through the regular military command structure, they reported directly to Saddam Hussein. You are also deliberately avoiding the point that Saddam used the RG to suppress rebellions and provide all that internal security, even against the rest of the Army. Or are you suggesting that the Republican Guard should not have been disbanded in 2003? ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/65 "2014-06-13T20:02:28Z")
> [@](#): > > **Dissonance** > If this is how you choose to define ‘terrorist organization’, then you have widened the term to have no meaning. The US Air Force is a terrorist organization by that definition. So is every military that has ever existed. They car bombed a hotel full of US officers, they launched the Tet offensive, they assassinated regional administrators out in the provinces, Christ, how much more evidence of them being a terrorist organisation do you want? > [@](#): > > This is just rediculous. The battle tactics themselves were what the ARVN was supposed to have been trained, supplied and equipped to do. That it was incapable of doing so, with US advisors, in a conventional battle was the whole point. It is simply absurd for you to claim that Ap Bac being a conventional battle was not significant when it was, in fact, the entire point. It was the type of battle that the ARVN was supposed to be able to win against the Viet Cong, which is why the VC had avoided engaging in pitched battle with the ARVN. That they deliberately presented themselves for battle with the ARVN, fought them in conventional battle and won was the whole point of Ap Bac. You’re confusing the minutiae of the tactics with the point I was making, the Iraqi army has been defeated by insurgents, an army which had been given billions of US dollars in aid advice and support, and which the US had recreated, and it failed, those are the comparisons to Ap Bac, and why I said as such. The fact Ap Bac was conventional or not is irrelevant to the point I have been making ad infinitum to you. > [@](#): > > Because 1) it has never been an effective fighting force before 2003 to begin with and 2) the current year is 2014. Again, Iraq’s army was effective in handling internal security. Bremer was diligent in his destruction of one of the only lynchpins in Iraqi social cohesion. > [@](#): > > Now you’re just being deliberately obtuse. Read your own quote “The Republican Guard were the elite troops of the Iraqi army directly reporting to Saddam Hussein”; they did not report through the regular military command structure, they reported directly to Saddam Hussein. You are also deliberately avoiding the point that Saddam used the RG to suppress rebellions and provide all that internal security, even against the rest of the Army. Or are you suggesting that the Republican Guard should not have been disbanded in 2003? The head of the armed forces was President Saddam Hussein. If a dictator used portions of the army to suppress other parts, why is this any big surprise, it happens in all dictatorships, doesn’t mean the army was ineffective. I didn’t avoid any accounts of them suppressing rebellions in the country, the point is those rebellions were not successful, where as these present ones are due to US incompetence in the occupation of Iraq. ---
**Author:** ![Laggard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de053/32.png) [@Laggard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laggard)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 8:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/66 "2014-06-13T20:22:45Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > They car bombed a hotel full of US officers, they launched the Tet offensive, they assassinated regional administrators out in the provinces, Christ, how much more evidence of them being a terrorist organisation do you want? > . How was the Tet offensive a terrorist act? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Fornicator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7bcc69/32.png) [@The\_Fornicator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Fornicator)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/67 "2014-06-13T20:51:05Z")
Because whenever the US props up a puppet or invades a country itself, the indiginous opposition is always terrorists. $35 billion of ‘training’ and equipment evaporates in a week. Obv. this won’t be repeated in Afghanistan, we’ve had assurances. I also love the idea of more US policy in the Middle East/Persia - what could possibly go wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/68 "2014-06-13T20:57:11Z")
> [@Laggard](#): > > How was the Tet offensive a terrorist act? It was an offensive designed to overthrow the South Vietnamese government whilst instigating Khoi Ngia (Uprising) of the Urban masses. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Fornicator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7bcc69/32.png) [@The\_Fornicator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Fornicator)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/69 "2014-06-13T21:06:51Z")
South Vietnam’ was a nonsense put up job that lasted 20 years. Goodness knows how. ---
**Author:** ![Laggard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9de053/32.png) [@Laggard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Laggard)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 9:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/70 "2014-06-13T21:06:51Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > It was an offensive designed to overthrow the South Vietnamese government whilst instigating Khoi Ngia (Uprising) of the Urban masses. So any militant group seeking to overthrow a government is now a terrorist organization? Our founding fathers were terrorists? ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/71 "2014-06-13T21:12:31Z")
> [@Laggard](#): > > So any militant group seeking to overthrow a government is now a terrorist organization? Our founding fathers were terrorists? Yup. ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/72 "2014-06-13T21:33:28Z")
There’s really no point in continuing this with you, it seems all you really want is to be the one to get the last word in, regardless of how wrong you are. In any event, > [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > They car bombed a hotel full of US officers, they launched the Tet offensive, they assassinated regional administrators out in the provinces, Christ, how much more evidence of them being a terrorist organisation do you want? In what possible way does this make them a terrorist organization? The US bombed villages inside free fire zones under the assumption that they were VC sympathizers, they bombed civilian infrastructure in North Vietnam, and they mined North Vietnamese harbors. There’s a list of scores of offensive operations launched by the US, the Republic of Vietnam and Free World Allies in Vietnam just in 1968, the year of the Tet Offensive [here](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_allied_military_operations_of_the_Vietnam_War_(1968)). The US assassinated between [26,000 and 41,000](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Program) suspected Viet Cong governmental officials out in the provinces. Again, you’re defining ‘terrorist organization’ so widely that it has no meaning. If under your definition and by your illogic the Viet Cong were a terrorist organization, so was the US military. So was the South Vietnamese military, in fact so was Diem’s government, so the War in Vietnam could be described as a conflict between terrorist organizations according to your illogic. > [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > You’re confusing the minutiae of the tactics with the point I was making, the Iraqi army has been defeated by insurgents, an army which had been given billions of US dollars in aid advice and support, and which the US had recreated, and it failed, those are the comparisons to Ap Bac, and why I said as such. The fact Ap Bac was conventional or not is irrelevant to the point I have been making ad infinitum to you. And again, it was not “the minutiae of the tactics”, it was the entire point of Ap Bac. Or do you imagine insurgents defeating the Iraqi Army in open battle and taking over entire cities don’t count as conventional warfare? > [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > Again, Iraq’s army was effective in handling internal security. Bremer was diligent in his destruction of one of the only lynchpins in Iraqi social cohesion. And again, no it wasn’t. The Iraqi Army wasn’t effective at handling internal security; Saddam Hussein has effective at handling internal security. His tool for doing so wasn’t even the regular Iraqi Army, it was the Republican Guard which was loyal to and reported directly to him, not to other generals in the normal Army command structure. More importantly, you are inventing this idea that the Iraqi Army was a lynchpin of Iraqi social cohesion. It makes even less sense than your idea that Iraqis have “a shared identity as being subjects of the former Ottoman Empire.” Bremer’s decision was stupid, but the Iraqi Army had disintegrated in the face of the invasion anyway, and more importantly that was over 10 years ago. If we were having this discussion a decade ago, the recent disbanding of the Iraqi Army would be a good excuse for their piss poor performance. If in your mind a decade isn’t enough time for an army to put itself into order, how much time is? 25 years? 50? A century? The simple fact is that the Iraqi Army has never been an effective force in its entire history. This “lynchpin of Iraqi social cohesion” has fallen apart in every single conflict Iraq has fought in its entire history. It’s never been particularly popular with the Iraqi people, desertion and mass surrenders have been the norm. The army only exploded in size due to the debacle of Saddam’s 1980 invasion of Iran which turned into an 8 year long meat grinder of a war. ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2014, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/73 "2014-06-13T22:23:48Z")
> [@](#): > > **Dissonance** > There’s really no point in continuing this with you, it seems all you really want is to be the one to get the last word in, regardless of how wrong you are. In any event, Pot, kettle, black. > [@](#): > > In what possible way does this make them a terrorist organization? The US bombed villages inside free fire zones under the assumption that they were VC sympathizers, they bombed civilian infrastructure in North Vietnam, and they mined North Vietnamese harbors. There’s a list of scores of offensive operations launched by the US, the Republic of Vietnam and Free World Allies in Vietnam just in 1968, the year of the Tet Offensive here. The US assassinated between 26,000 and 41,000 suspected Viet Cong governmental officials out in the provinces. Again, you’re defining ‘terrorist organization’ so widely that it has no meaning. If under your definition and by your illogic the Viet Cong were a terrorist organization, so was the US military. So was the South Vietnamese military, in fact so was Diem’s government, so the War in Vietnam could be described as a conflict between terrorist organizations according to your illogic. So the US acted as bad as the terrorist organisation it was opposed too, and? Diems government was the established government, the legitimate government in the eyes of the US, and therefore the opposition which was in the early days primarily the NLF, was a designated terrorist organisation. I never said they were wrong to oppose Diems government, just that they were clearly a terrorist organisation, so enjoy that ‘illogic’ > [@](#): > > And again, it was not “the minutiae of the tactics”, it was the entire point of Ap Bac. Or do you imagine insurgents defeating the Iraqi Army in open battle and taking over entire cities don’t count as conventional warfare? You still do not understand the main crux of the argument when I made the comparison between the two. They were both US supported armed forces and they couldn’t defeat the insurgents they were opposed too due to incompetence despite years of backing from the US government and allies. This seems to have gone completely over your head. > [@](#): > > And again, no it wasn’t. The Iraqi Army wasn’t effective at handling internal security; Saddam Hussein has effective at handling internal security. His tool for doing so wasn’t even the regular Iraqi Army, it was the Republican Guard which was loyal to and reported directly to him, not to other generals in the normal Army command structure. Geez if the Iraqi army was this terrible you’d of think Iran would be occupying it now due to the Iraq-Iran war. > [@](#): > > More importantly, you are inventing this idea that the Iraqi Army was a lynchpin of Iraqi social cohesion. It makes even less sense than your idea that Iraqis have “a shared identity as being subjects of the former Ottoman Empire.” Bremer’s decision was stupid, but the Iraqi Army had disintegrated in the face of the invasion anyway, and more importantly that was over 10 years ago. Again, Bremers decision is what triggered the poor combat results we see today. Sure, the army disintegrated, but it could of been reconstituted better if he didn’t permanently bar experienced officers and former soldiers from enlisting once the war had ended, he didn’t hence a more brutal sectarianism and insurgent campaign. > [@](#): > > If we were having this discussion a decade ago, the recent disbanding of the Iraqi Army would be a good excuse for their piss poor performance. If in your mind a decade isn’t enough time for an army to put itself into order, how much time is? 25 years? 50? A century? The simple fact is that the Iraqi Army has never been an effective force in its entire history. But it’s been more effective than it has now, and you know it. The Syrian Army is just as ‘piss poor’ as the Iraqi one of before 2003, yet is somehow being able to hold its own in its own civil war, despite desertions and support from Hezbollah and Iran. > [@](#): > > This “lynchpin of Iraqi social cohesion” has fallen apart in every single conflict Iraq has fought in its entire history. It’s never been particularly popular with the Iraqi people, desertion and mass surrenders have been the norm. The army only exploded in size due to the debacle of Saddam’s 1980 invasion of Iran which turned into an 8 year long meat grinder of a war. Fallen apart in every single conflict in its history, except the Iraq-Iran war. Which until before 1991, was the biggest war of it’s history. ---
**Author:** ![AK84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2014, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/74 "2014-06-14T06:45:19Z")
> [@Dissonance](#): > > time is? 25 years? 50? A century? The simple fact is that the Iraqi Army has never been an effective force in its entire history. This “lynchpin of Iraqi social cohesion” has fallen apart in every single conflict Iraq has fought in its entire history. 25 to 50 years give or take. It takes at least 20 years for a young officer to become General officer material, for their to be the professional backbone of the Army in NCO to be raised, for the institutional memory to develop. ---
**Author:** ![tagos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@tagos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tagos)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2014, 6:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/75 "2014-06-16T06:28:33Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > But it’s been more effective than it has now, and you know it. The Syrian Army is just as ‘piss poor’ as the Iraqi one of before 2003, yet is somehow being able to hold its own in its own civil war, despite desertions and support from Hezbollah and Iran. At the risk of inserting facts into your worldview. The syrian army is holding it’s own BECAUSE of, not DESPITE Hezbollah and Iranian support. They are backing and fighting for Assad’s regime. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2014, 12:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/76 "2014-06-16T12:45:31Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > In terms of the late Samuel P. Huntington’s [Clash of Civilizations](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clash_of_Civilizations) theory, Iraq is part of the Islamic civilization, which today has no core-state, but the Ottoman Empire (also encompassing some territories within Orthodox civilization) once was its core-state. Any sense of common identity shared by former Ottoman territories probably amounts to that – and only applies to those former Ottoman territories that were/are Islamic territories. Believe me, the Greeks and the Serbs have no sense of fellow-feeling with the Turks. Wait, what? Since when did Islamic civilisation even have a ‘core state’? And since when were the Ottomans it? Seems to me you would have to forget about Persia, Muslim India, and the Muslim states of Africa and Southeast Asia to conclude that. Samuel Huntington’s theories are nice as a useful corrective to politically correct ‘all cultures are equally good’ thinking, but beyond that it’s pretty silly and should be junked. Conflicts are as likely to happen within civilisations as between them, and they’re as likely to be about ideology or economics as about culture. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2014, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/77 "2014-06-16T12:47:48Z")
Also, if the VC were terrorists than the term has no meaning. Guerrilla warfare is not the same, or not necessarily the same, as terrorism. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2014, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/78 "2014-06-16T15:08:57Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > Also, if the VC were terrorists than the term has no meaning. Guerrilla warfare is not the same, or not necessarily the same, as terrorism. The Viet Cong certainly committed acts of terrorism, if by terrorism one means “killed civilians in order to terrorize people”. > **[Communist terrorism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communist_terrorism#Vietnam)** > > Communist terrorism is terrorism perpetrated by individuals or groups which adhere to communism and ideologies related to it, such as Marxism–Leninism, Maoism, and Trotskyism. Historically, communist terrorism has sometimes taken the form of state-sponsored terrorism, supported by communist nations such as the Soviet Union, China, North Korea and Democratic Kampuchea. In addition, non-state actors such as the Red Brigades, the Front Line and the Red Army Faction have also engaged The end of t... > [@](#): > > During World War II the communist Viet Minh fought a guerilla campaign led by Ho Chi Minh against the Japanese occupation forces and, following Japan’s surrender, French colonial forces. This insurgency continued until 1954 as the Vietminh evolved into the Vietcong (VC), which fought against both the South Vietnamese government and American forces.[41] These campaigns involved terrorism resulting in the deaths of thousands.[42][43] Although an armistice was signed between the Viet Minh and the French forces in 1954, terrorist actions continued.[44] Carol Winkler has written that in the 1950s, Vietcong terrorism was rife in South Vietnam, with political leaders, provincial chiefs, teachers, nurses, doctors, and members of the military targeted. Between 1965 and 1972, Vietcong terrorists had killed over 33,000 people and abducted a further 57,000.[45][46] Terrorist actions in Saigon were described by Nghia M. Vo as “long and murderous.” In these campaigns, South Vietnamese prime minister Tran Van Huong was the target of an assassination attempt; in 1964 alone, the Vietcong carried out 19,000 attacks on civilian targets.[47] > > Infant victim of Dak Son massacreDouglas Pike has called the Massacre at Huế one of the worst communist terrorist actions of the Vietnam War.[48] Estimates of the losses in the massacre have been cited as high as 6,000 dead.[49][50] The United States Army recorded as killed “3800 killed in and around Huế, 2786 confirmed civilians massacred, 2226 civilians found in mass graves and 16 non Vietnamese civilians killed.”[51] While some historians have claimed a majority of these deaths occurred from US bombing in the fight to retake the city, the vast majority of the dead were found in mass graves outside the city.[52] Benjamin A. Valentino has estimated a total death toll of between 45,000 and 80,000 people between 1954 and 1975 from VC terrorism.[28] > > Pike has also described the Dak Son Massacre, in which the Vietcong used flamethrowers against civilians in Dak Son, killing 252, as a terrorist act.[53] In May 1967, Dr. Tran Van-Luy reported to the World Health Organization “that over the previous 10 years Communist terrorists had destroyed 174 dispensaries, maternity homes and hospitals.”[54] Ami Pedahzur has written that “the overall volume and lethality of Vietcong terrorism rivals or exceeds all but a handful (e.g. Algeria, Sri Lanka) of terrorist campaigns waged over the last third of the twentieth century,”[55] and that the VC used suicide terrorism as a form of propaganda of the deed.[56] Arthur J. Dommen has written that the majority of those killed due to VC terrorism were civilians, caught in ambushes as they traveled on buses, and that the group burnt down villages and forcibly conscripted members.[57] I’m not pointing this out as a way to deligitimize them - simply as a factual matter, they used terrorism against civilians as one of their tactics. Whether this makes them “terrorists” or not strikes me as a matter of semantics. There is no dount the US also used terror tactics, such as destroying civilian villages known to support the Communist side, but when an organized army does that, we usually call that “war crimes”. ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2014, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/79 "2014-06-16T16:38:05Z")
What bugs me about some of the analysis is that some political commentators have described the areas which the Sunnis inhabit as a backwater, so what? IIRC, every empire, political ideology starts from an obscure area and then makes headway into more strategic areas, and it’s this kind of thinking which is dangerous, because it allows us to think that ISIS won’t be much a threat to Westerners in the future. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2014, 1:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473/80 "2014-06-17T01:56:28Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > Wait, what? Since when did Islamic civilisation even have a ‘core state’? And since when were the Ottomans it? Since 1453, when the Turks conquered Constantinople. The [Ottoman Caliphate](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottoman_Caliphate) dates from about then, and, while Shi’a Muslims may have simply ignored that claim, no Sunni Muslims contested it. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/isis-in-the-middle-east-is-growing/690473.md?page=5)