CIA chief: Iraq, Syria might not remain unified

By Kasim Ileri

WASHINGTON

Iraq and Syria may not remain united after years of destruction and bloodshed, according to the head of the CIA.

“I don’t know whether or not Syria and Iraq can be put back together again,” John Brennan said in an interview published Thursday in the September issue of the West Point Military Academy’s journal, CTC Sentinel.

“There’s been so much bloodletting, so much destruction, so many continued, seething tensions and sectarian divisions. I question whether we will see, in my lifetime, the creation of a central government in both of those countries that’s going to have the ability to govern fairly,” he said.

The CIA chief also addressed the ongoing effort by the U.S.-led coalition to liberate key Mosul in Iraq and Raqqa in Syria from Daesh, underscoring that the liberation of the two strongholds of the militant group would not be as easy as perceived.

“They’re dense urban environments,” he said. “We’ve seen how difficult it was to liberate Manbij from Daesh, a city that was maybe 180,000 or so before the conflict started. You look at Raqqa, much larger than that, a very dense urban environment. Mosul, over a million.”

Brennan warned that if Daesh chooses to “hunker down and fight” there would be a tough urban battle that would claim the lives of a lot of civilians.

“It’ll be interesting to see how those civilians are going to react once there is an effort to liberate both those cities,” he said.

He claimed that some Iraqi Sunni tribes in the area will join the winner of the Mosul war, saying most of the tribes have sided with Daesh as it has been victorious in two years of fighting.

According to Brennan, foreign fighters who have joined Daesh may present a challenge for Western governments for years to come if they are not killed on the battlefield.

“The numbers are just astronomical in terms of the thousands upon thousands of individuals that have gone in there,” he said. “And will they be able to put their violent past behind them? A lot depends on sort of where they go and whether they feel as though they can be a part of society again.”