Deciphering Islamic State

"ISIL, as an organization, would not exist without former Baathists."
"Restructuring the Army was necessary but the U.S. did not understand the concept of 'Keep your friends close and your enemies closer."
"[The U.S.] pushed away into the shadows all the dangerous enemies it had in Iraq."
Sajad Jiyad, senior researcher, Iraq analyst, al-Bayan Center for Studies and Planning, Baghdad

Islamic State has seized large swathes of territory in Syria and Iraq

"A lot of them [former Baathists] view the jihadists with this Leninist mindset that they're useful idiots who we can use to rise to power."
Professor Ahmed Hashim, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

"[The Baathist involvement is] not inherently inconsistent with a view of [ISIL] as an ideological and religious organization [because] the vast majority of its followers and fighters are in it for the religion."
"It's pretty unlikely we're going to see a gotcha moment in three years where 'ISIL] suddenly says, 'Ha ha, just kidding', and installs Saddam Jr. in Baghdad."
J.M. Berger, fellow Brookings Institute

Syrian-born Abu Mohammed al-Adnani is Islamic State's official spokesman

Over 25 of ISIL's leadership hierarchy, in a previous incarnation were Baathists in the Saddam Hussein military according to Brig.-General Hassan Dulaimi who lost his job as an intelligence officer in 2003 when the United States disbanded the Baathist-led military after its invasion routed the army and unseated Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri featured as the "King of Clubs" on that card deck listing the most wanted personnel of Saddam's regime was one of those 25 leaders until he was killed north of Baghdad in battle.

Islamic State gained much under his direction since 2014. Iraq's deputy interior minister spoke of three of ISIL's top six military commanders: Haji Bakr, Abu Ayman al-Iraqi and Abu Ahmad al-Alwani, all former Baathist party members of elite ranking. Former Baathists were battle hardened and added immensely to the rise of Islamic State, in their familiarity with advanced military technology and experience in the oppressive fear they placed on civilian populations. They represented, after all, a thuggish regime under Saddam.

When the U.S. proceeded with an order to disband the Saddam Baathist army in 2004, over 250,000 soldiers and officers were suddenly without a job. Being below the rank of colonel enabled those affected to re-enlist in the new army that resulted. The higher-ranking officers were barred from the new military. A "catastrophic error [that] gave every reason to a vanquished enemy -- battle-hardened officers -- to fight the U.S. and further destroy Iraq", pointed out Iraqi analyst Sajad Jiyad.

Those thousands of professional, trained soldiers melded into a violent insurgency where guerrilla attacks and suicide bombings roiled the country, and improvised explosive devices killed thousands of American and Iraqi troops, not to speak of Iraqi officials and civilians. What emerged was a tactical alliance between terrorist groups like al-Qaeda in Iraq, former Baathist military and Sunni tribal members. The ideological differences mattered less than the shared impetus to reclaim control of Iraq.

There are conflicting reports about the fate of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi

Since Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi assumed control by becoming the Islamic State leader and caliph in 2010, he led an aggressive movement in recruiting former Baathists from Saddam's regime. They were suddenly welcomed into Islamic State whereas previously, because of their secular ideology they weren't seen as a suitable match for Islamic State jihadis whose loyalty is to fundamentalist Islamism. And though Baathists are now aligned with Islamic State, they don't share its faith in Islamist jihad.

Which makes them no less effective in the role they have undertaken, in support of and cooperation with the terrorist militias that reflect their own hatred of Shiite-dominated Iraq.