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Source: http://fathomjournal.org/is-and-the-incoherence-of-western-policy/
In the Core Sunni-Shia War, the West Has No Ally
(Fathom-BICOM) Jonathan Spyer - The West has no ground assets in Syria capable of destroying IS, and history contains no examples of states which were destroyed solely from the air. What is taking place in Iraq, Syria and increasingly also in Lebanon is a single, cross-border sectarian war, effectively pitting a Shia alliance led by the Iranians and including Hizbullah, the government of Iraq, Iraqi Shia militias and the Assad regime against a much more confused and disparate Sunni camp, of which IS is a mutated product. In the core Sunni-Shia war, the West has no ally. The Shia bloc constitutes the most powerful anti-Western alliance currently in existence in the Middle East. Among the Sunni Arabs, meanwhile, are some of the most brutal organizations ever to have emerged anywhere - such as IS. The victory of either camp would not constitute progress in any form for the people living in the states in question.