© Stringer / Reuters'Woohoo! This is so much fun! I'm getting paid American dollars to ride this American tank and pretend I'm Syrian!'
It's
estimated that the three-year conflict in Syria has drawn foreign fighters to its frontlines at a rate faster than any such war in modern memory, including the struggle of the Afghan mujahideen against the Soviet Union in the 1980s. The group that likely boasts the majority of such combatants is the Islamic State, the powerful terrorist organization that now commands a stretch of territory from central Syria to the environs of Iraq's capital, Baghdad.
The presence of these foreign jihadists has dominated media attention of late. Earlier this week, reports emerged of an American fighter slain in Syria in a battle with another Islamist faction. On Thursday, the White House
identified nearly a dozen Americans believed to have joined the conflict in Syria. A British national is suspected to have beheaded American journalist James Foley this month, while a pair of Australians have gained notoriety for their habit of posting selfies on social media of them grinning while
clutching the severed heads of Assad regime soldiers.
The Soufan Group, a New York-based intelligence firm,
estimated in June that there were at least 12,000
foreign fighters from 81 countries in the Syrian conflict, including some 3,000 European nationals. Given the Islamic State's ascendance - and
its slick online recruitment operation - it's probable that the bulk of the Western militants are in its ranks. The
Economist published a handy graphic of the breakdown this week:
Comment:
The total numbers are probably higher...
Understatement of the decade.
The Russians alone have sent about 70,000 to hell since 2015. The total number of foreign fighters shipped into Syria since 2011 is probably around 200,000, or higher.
One country heftily contributing to 'Jihadi Manpower', and not even mentioned above, is
Pakistan, a Muslim country of some quarter-billion people and lots and lots of unemployed, Saudi-madrassa-educated young males.
A 'civil war' this most certainly aint. It's a dirty, dirty proxy war, and elites from Washington to Islamabad are all in on it.
Comment: Jeff Bezos's net worth just passed the $100 billion dollar mark