Priming Strategic Communications: Countering the Appeal of ISIS

Abstract

Abstract: This article examines the Islamist rationale used by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) to recruit and sustain its members. It proposes counter-narratives using Islamist thinking to challenge the veracity of ISIS thought and action. A counter-ISIS information campaign is proposed to persuade potential recruits and current members that joining ISIS violates basic Islamic principles. ********** his September 10, 2014 address to the United Nauons, President Obama said of the jihadist group Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), only language understood by killers like this is the language of force. (1) The president then announced that the United States would lead an air campaign against ISIS targets, partnering with Arab and European forces, Iraqi forces would conduct the bulk of the ground combat. The application of military force alone is not likely to defeat ISIS, especially given the reluctance of the United States and other regional powers to commit ground forces. The United States must reach for other instruments of power, including the use of information operations to increase its capacity to degrade and defeat ISIS. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Martin Dempsey makes this point specifically, calling for a whole of government approach challenging ISIS' religious claims: In particular, stripping away their cloak of religious legitimacy behind which they hide. (2) The real vulnerability of ISIS is not its brutality, which seems to draw followers, but rather its claim to be a true Islamic group, when its operations significantly violate fundamental Islamic tenets. The writings of the very Islamic theorists who are considered foundations of jihadi Sunni Islam contradict ISIS's claims concerning the religious legitimacy of their actions, and the most legitimate source of Islam, the Qur'an, specifically forbids many of ISIS' actions. (3) Remove its claim of religious legitimization of murder and destruction, and ISIS becomes only a criminal enterprise. As ISIS uses Islam to recruit and motivate members, its embrace of Islam may ultimately expose it as a naked emperor, who has distorted the core of Islam to the point where ISIS members may be guilty of the very crime it attaches to its Muslim victims--apostasy. (4) The confrontation with ISIS is the latest in a series of hostilities that the United States has had with radical Islamist-inspired groups, and US policy makers have almost always developed a counter-radical Islam operation as a part of a larger strategy to defeat these groups. Previous campaigns have tried to block Islamist messages, or offered pro-American missives (including American music and cooking), or using de-radicalized Muslims to counter radical imagery. Other operations have killed the messenger (Bin Laden, Anwar al-Awlaqi, for examples). Current campaigns show no changes--in August 2014, the US State Department's Center for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications launched a media campaign to counter ISIS. It distributed videos showing a beheaded corpse and other savagery committed, calling upon potential recruits to think again, turn away. contrast, ISIS wages a slick social media campaign offering all the advantages of jihad (jihad is a cure for depression, and you can even bring your family). The effectiveness of the State Department's campaign can be measured even in social media; an ISIS jihadi got 32 favorites for his recruiting hashtag, at the same time, the State Department's posting got zero. Efforts to counter ISIS propaganda continue to fall short, as ISIS recruiting success indicates; ISIS enrolled over 6,000 new members in June 2014, according to one source. (5) It is time to invest more heavily in counter-ISIS information campaigns that use Salafiyya Islam itself to counter the ISIS appeal. This essay briefly discusses Salafiyya thought, the supposed source of ISIS thinking and inspiration. …