Regional armies have “no chance” of defeating the Islamic State (IS) horde if the terror group continues its brainwashing and recruiting campaign that replenishes its numbers with foreign fighters, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi told Der Speigel, RT reported on Sunday.
“If Daesh [the Arabic acronym for IS] continues to recruit so many from other countries, then no army in our region can stand up to it,” al-Abadi said in an interview with the German magazine. “They keep on recruiting people, they have huge financial resources and, honestly, a uniformed army alone cannot face it on its own.”
Local extremists that join the IS cause are not a major problem as they tend to flee and disappear among the locals instead of engaging in direct fight with Iraqi forces, the Prime Minister stated. But foreign fighters he says are a real threat, against which the Iraqi army stands no chance in regaining control of the country.
“Fifty-seven percent of Daesh fighters are Iraqi. But, honestly, when we enter a city with our forces, we ignore them – they don’t stand up and they will run away. It is the 43 percent who are foreign fighters who have been indoctrinated ideologically who have their backs up against the wall,” al-Abadi explained.
While IS remains a major threat everywhere in Iraq, it is also a problem for the whole world, the PM stressed.
Al-Abadi admitted that last summer IS captured vast parts of the country “without a fight,” and through the use of “psychological warfare.” The PM also blamed President Barack Obama for not responding earlier to the threat posed.“ Baghdad was being threatened by them and, in actual fact, there was no action from the US or anybody else,” he said.
From the very beginning IS relied on “vicious and criminal” atrocities and fear in order to gain support on the ground, al-Abadi said. But he added that eventually the psychological warfare has seen a reversal, with the atrocities the group commits now working against IS.
