Analytic Memo 2: History of ISIS

by Dack Anderson, Lead Security Consultant

Image: Wali Sabawoon/Getty Images. Published on March 2, 2020.

As part of my academic journey at Pikes Peak State College, I had the opportunity to study ESA4010: Terrorism Threat & Risk Analysis in 2022, a critical course that deepened my understanding of terrorism-related threats, emergency response strategies, and analytical methods. Under the guidance of Professor Woody Byrd, I conducted extensive research using structured assessment models to analyze whether ISIS remains a threat to the United States.

Over the next few months, I will continue sharing segments of my research in bi-weekly posts, each exploring critical aspects of ISIS’s structure, operations, and evolving threat landscape. This second installment, Analytic Memo 2: History of ISIS, examines the group’s origins, key historical milestones, and the factors that shaped its rise on the global stage. By tracing ISIS’s development, we gain deeper insight into its strategic shifts, ideological foundations, and long-term impact on international security. Future posts will build upon this analysis, covering topics such as recruitment strategies, financing, intelligence operations, and global affiliations.

Key Findings

It is now known that the Islamic State's caliphate was to be the cornerstone for a more diligent form of global jihad. Today, let us discuss the major milestones of ISIS, its organizational development, and the ideology and activities of the terrorist organization. The history of ISIS can be divided into four specific periods: The first period of its founder Abu Musab al-Zarqawi; The second of its strategic phase, including the founding of the Islamic State of Iraq; The third of transnational expansion and founding of the caliphate; and the final stage of decline and shifting to a guerrilla insurgency. 

The first period covers the early 1990s to 2006. The common link between Muslim militant groups in the past was the basic ideology of Hasan al-Banna and Sayyed Qutb's teachings of an extremist form of defending Islam. The ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, whose organizational goal was establishing a caliphate. Zarqawi wanted to form a caliphate by using Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) to provoke an Iraqi civil war. His brutal methods were reluctantly agreed on by Al-Qaeda so that the insurgents would turn against the American forces. After the death of al-Zarqawi by a US air strike in 2006, the leadership fell to the Minister of War Abu Ayyub al-Masri, and, because of military setbacks, the organization remained dormant until 2010, when Baghdadi became the emir (Nair, 2016). 

The second period consists of the founding of the Islamic State of Iraq under al-Zarqawi in 2006, its first decimating defeat in 2008 by Sunni and US forces, and the four-year rebuilding interval afterward. This period's milestone is the making of most strategic and covert operations under Baghdadi's command. Later on, the organization's characteristics were heavily influenced by his leadership (Ingram, H., Whiteside, C., and Winter, C., 2022). 

The third period covers the years from 2011 to 2016 and is noted by the declaration of the Islamic State (also known as ISIS, ISIL, or Daesh) caliphate in Syria and Iraq. It was during this phase it had a dramatic expansion effort, attracted followers from an affiliate network in at least eight other countries, and began terrorist operations outside the so-called caliphate (Glenn, C., et al., 2019). 

Starting in mid-2016, ISIS advances began to falter. It was in this phase that the spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adnani prepared the organization for its imminent fall off before being killed in a US airstrike. The group began to lose territory, resources, and personnel. After losing the caliphate in 2019, it continues to wage a global insurgency by guerrilla warfare from West Africa to East Asia (Glenn, C., et al., 2019) (Ingram, H., Whiteside, C., and Winter, C., 2022).

Meaning of Findings

Reviewing the history of ISIS and observing its milestones, one can see that the original dreamers of ISIS for a caliphate state had to be patient and resilient and have the ability to pass on that dream to others. By outmaneuvering its adversaries while learning to evolve from its defeats, ISIS has been able to capture the support of impoverished Sunnis. Its expansive network remains a subdued, persistent menace throughout West, Central, and East Africa, fleetingly in Southeast Asia, and other places around the globe. Though the group has suffered significant military and political defeats, it has developed a cooperative effort around the world and has inspired its followers and supporters that a caliphate is possible to build and maintain without the support of the West, particularly the United States. ISIS is defeated, but not destroyed, and remains active as defeat is not permanent. 

Assessment of Findings

As a student of emergency management and a future prospective player in advanced security, this study has left some serious, unanswered questions. With the history of the evolution of ISIS, an organization with a central ideology of being the representative of authentic Islam known as Wahhabism, and the known characteristics of patience and durability, why are eyes turning away from finishing off this presently defeated foe? After its devastating defeat in 2016, it took only three years to come back and be defeated again in 2019. During those three years, it was able to develop and strengthen its global network and convert to a guerrilla army on several continents. But defeating an ideology of this sort is not an easy matter, as keeping the focus on this threat has become more difficult as many coalition partners have turned to give internal matters a higher priority.

References: 

Glenn, C., Rowan, M., Caves, J., and Nada, G. (2019, October 19). Timeline: the Rise, Spread, and Fall of the Islamic State. The Wilson Center. Retrieved September 18, 2022, from https://www.wilsoncenter.org/article/timeline-the-rise-spread-and-fall-the-islamic-state 

Ingram, H., Whiteside, C., and Winter, C. (2022, January). Lessons from the Islamic State’s ‘Milestone’ Texts and Speeches. Combating Terrorism Center at West Point. Retrieved September 18, 2022, from https://ctc.usma.edu/lessons-islamic-states-milestone-texts-speeches/ 

Ingram, H., Whiteside, C., and Winter, C. (2022, May 22). The Islamic State’s Global Insurgency and Its Counterstrategy Implications. The International Centre for Counter Terrorism. Retrieved September 18, 2022, from https://icct.nl/app/uploads/2020/11/Special-Edition-2-2.pdf 

Nair, K. N. (2016, October). The Rise and Future of ISIS. Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defense Studies and Analyses (India): Journal of Defense Studies. Retrieved September 18, 2022, from https://idsa.in/system/files/jds/jds_10_4_2016_the-rise-and-future-of-isis.pdf