Well, folks, grab your beer and settle down, because the Middle East just pulled off a plot twist that’d make Vidya Balan’s Kahani blush. ISIS, those bearded fanatics who spent years slicing throats and dreaming of a caliphate straight out of a 7th-century fever dream, have traded their battle fatigues for designer suits and hairdos and have panther-walked into Damascus like they’re auditioning for the Shark Tank. Meanwhile, good old Uncle Sam, who swore up and down that he was hell-bent on turning ISIS into fertilizer, is now shaking hands with their leader like the two are sealing a pre-owned flat deal. And if you’re scratching your head at all that, no problem, because even I am.
USA’s “War” Against ISIS
Let’s rewind. Back in the Obama years, when ISIS was on a rampage through Syria and Iraq, the US and the Western narrative was clear: these guys were the devil’s own, and it was the noble duty of the great and mighty US of A to bomb them back to the Stone Age. Billions in hardware, endless drone strikes, and enough Pentagon PowerPoints to strip the entire Amazon rainforests — all to “degrade and destroy” the black-flag-waving terrorists. Except, funny thing, the more Uncle Sam bombed, the more they seemed to thrive, like roaches in a radiator.
Conspiracies swirled — tinfoil hats whispered that Uncle was secretly funnelling cash and guns to the very jihadists that he was supposedly fighting. “Nonsense!” cried the high and mighty Beltway officials. “America doesn’t play footsie with terrorists!” Well, what’d you know… Fast-forward to 2025, and here we are, watching U.S. diplomats clink glasses with the ISIS boss who’s probably still got blood under his fingernails. Tinfoil hats? They look more like Kevlar helmets now.
The Real Picture?
So, what could be the deal? Did the ISIS just get a PR makeover, or was this the plan all along? The cynic in me — and let’s be honest, that’s most of me — suspects the latter. The Middle East is Washington’s favourite chessboard, and the pieces move in ways that’d make Machiavelli dizzy. ISIS, or whatever they’re calling themselves now (Jihad Inc., maybe?), has conveniently shifted its crosshairs to Iran, the Houthis, and the Shia crescent in general. Coincidence? Pretty please! This smells like a Pentagon op wrapped in a CIA bow. Uncle has been itching to kneecap Iran for decades, and what better way than to let a bunch of rebranded zealots do the dirty work? Plausible deniability, dude — the old American way.
But here’s where it gets juicier. Saudi Arabia has suddenly stepped out from its Vision 2030 jazz and is cheering from the sidelines, facilitating this circus without a clue they could be next on the chopping block. If the House of Saud thinks it is playing some 10D chess, cozying up to jihadist-in-suits to counter Iran, I have no problem. They could play whatever they want. The issue here is that their military makes the Bangladesh Border Guards look like the Russian Spetsnaz. If ISIS 2.0 decides to turn its sights on Riyadh — I believe that will happen after they target Baghdad — those gold-plated palaces will be Caliphate Central before you can say “Whoopsie Wahhabi!”
Hillary Clinton, of all people, nailed it, when she said something like you don’t raise vipers in your backyard and expect them to only bite your neighbours. I hope MBS – who I have regards for – realizes that he is tossing cash at the very folks who’d love to see his prized kingdom as a medieval theme park.
However, it is not the KSA, it is Uncle Sam that I am amazed at. You see, ISIS always wanted a return to the glory days of Sharia – a land where dissenters get their head removed and women are seen but not heard. Syria is now their playground, and Uncle Sam seems fine with it, so long as his targets are Tehran and its proxies. Grasp that. Washington, that spent decades preaching democracy and human rights from a pedestal, is now greenlighting a regime that rounds up Syrian Christians and Shiites and sets them on fire. Is this just enabling a medieval fever dream? Is it new-age geopolitics with a side of amnesia? Or is this just Donald Trump and his characteristic shallowness?
A Caliphate Redux
Before you folks settle down with option three, let us look at how this got here. Back in 2012-15 phase, when ISIS was trying to carve out its proto-state before Putin bombed them, many of the serious guys — bloggers, army vets, political analysts — raised red flags about Uncle Sam’s complicity. Obama’s arms shipments to “moderate rebels” somehow ended up in jihadist hands. CIA programs trained Syrian and sundry other “fighters” who promptly joined the ISIS’s black-flag brigade after their training. A small horde of white European ISIS-hopefuls found their way to Syria through Turkey. And talking about Turkey, their borders stayed suspiciously porous, letting all that illegal ISIS oil from Syria flow through like cheap wine.
The official line was always “mistakes were made.” Mistakes, my ass. This was a feature, not a bug. Don’t blame Trump alone. Uncle needed a proxy to keep the region chaotic, Iran in check, and the military-industrial complex humming. And ISIS was the perfect patsy — until they got too big for their britches and Putin got serious about the matter. Hence a rebrand.
So here we are, in a world where ISIS runs Syria, the U.S. plays nice, and the Saudis are too busy counting their petrodollars to notice that perhaps that noose is tightening as we speak. The Middle East is a house of cards built on quicksand, and Washington’s lighting matches nearby. If this blows up — and it will — don’t be surprised when the same folks who engineered this mess blame everyone but themselves. As for the rest of us, we’ll watch the fireworks, wondering how a nation that landed on the moon keeps stepping in the same geopolitical dogpile everywhere every time. Pass that beer; maybe I’ll take a swig after all.
