War on the Rocks: “Redefining Victory in America’s War Against the Islamic State in Syria”

At War on the Rocks today, I have a new article urging the incoming Biden team to revisit U.S. counter-ISIS aims in Syria, after the Trump Administration twisted the definition of counter-ISIS victory to justify pursuing all sorts of other, unrelated policy ends.

https://warontherocks.com/2021/01/redefining-victory-in-americas-war-against-the-islamic-state-in-syria/

Under President Obama, America originally set out to "degrade and ultimately destroy" (or "ultimately defeat") the Islamic State (ISIS) in Syria and neighboring Iraq. In 2017, though, the Trump Administration changed the United States' stated aim to ISIS's "enduring defeat." "Enduring defeat," as Trump officials defined it, entailed not only the effective incapacitation of ISIS but also preventing its notional future return. "Enduring defeat" thus also meant addressing supposed "root causes" behind ISIS's rise, which, these officials argued, required dramatic change to Syria's political system and the removal of Iran-commanded forces from the country – things that will not happen, by all indications. The Trump administration had adopted an expansive, rubberized definition of "enduring defeat," stretched to cover all the United States' other, non-ISIS policy aims in Syria and to justify open-ended U.S. military involvement in the country.

The incoming Biden Administration's initial review of U.S. policy in Syria is a chance to revisit this elasticized definition of U.S. counter-ISIS objectives. "Enduring defeat," in the all-encompassing terms with which the Trump Administration defined it, is not achievable in Syria. The Biden team ought to ask, then: What does it really mean, for U.S. national security purposes, to "defeat" ISIS in Syria? And what level of U.S. involvement does that require?