Abstract
Significance While intensified air attacks will help weaken and contain ISG, they will not destroy it unless accompanied by a substantial ground force to defeat ISG on the ground. However, the lack of workable military solutions to the Iraqi and Syrian conflicts, and the legacy of the Afghanistan and Iraq interventions mean that the United States and other allies are averse to carrying out a large-scale ground deployment. Impacts Without robust international intervention, Syria's civil war will drag on for years, enabling ISG to hold onto significant territory. A large-scale US ground force operation would risk enflaming anti-US sentiment and escalating the geopolitical rivalry with Iran and Russia. Proxy forces and militia groups will embed themselves in Syrian and Iraqi politics, weakening central government. Threat of attacks by ISG- and al-Qaida-linked jihadists in the West will increase. Russia and Iran's much greater military role in Syria compared to the West will give them a much greater say on the conflict's outcome.
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