Why US airstrikes are important to rescue Indian hostages in Iraq

As Iraq continues to fall apart, India’s hope in getting back its 40 kidnapped citizens unharmed is pinned on robust external military support (read the United States) to repel the marauding al Qaeda affiliated Sunni outfit Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). These are factors beyond control of the Indian government. Sample a few here. Will US air raids happen? The ISIS militants, who are suspected to be holding the 40 Indians hostage, are currently in high spirits. The government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has virtually collapsed and Iraq as a nation is falling apart. The ISIS is notorious for its bestiality. Therefore, time is of essence when one talks about the safety of the kidnapped Indians in Iraq. [caption id=“attachment_1579281” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Relatives of Indian workers who were taken hostage in Iraq pose with photographs of their loved ones at the Golden Temple in Amritsar on 19 June 2014. AFP[/caption] Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin stirred the pot further with his chilling remark in his on-record briefing on Thursday that “There is no safety in captivity. You are safe there only where you are welcome.” If the militants are to be distracted, they have to be militarily challenged which the al-Maliki government has thus far been unable to do despite the fact that over $41 billion has been pumped into the 350,000-strong Iraqi army in last three years alone. The only way to do this, and a quick one at that, is the US launching air raids on the militants’ positions. But the US has backtracked on this, giving vital time to the ISIS to plan their strategies. US aerial raids, like in Iraq in 2003 and in Afghanistan in 2001, would have shattered the militants’ morale. They would have more urgent and important things to do than holding on to their hostages. Worsening relations between Nouri al- Maliki and Obama administration The US air raids have not happened and are unlikely to happen anytime soon. The stated American reason is that air raids are solely dependent on intelligence which is hardly available in Iraq today. The sudden rise and rise of ISIS in Iraq since 8 June when it seized control of key cities like Mosul and Tikrit has been made possible largely because of a complete collapse of the intelligence network. However, the real reason behind the Americans not launching air raids on militants’ positions in Iraq despite the Iraqi prime minister’s express appeal to that effect is something else. The Obama administration has fallen out with Nouri al-Maliki, the Shia leader who was ironically hand-picked by the US way back in 2006. The Obama administration is miffed with al-Maliki because it believes that he has failed to be an inclusive leader and contributed more to dividing the country on Shia-Sunni lines than harmonizing the fragmented polity and social structure of the country. Washington has given indications to Baghdad that it can consider launching air raids only after al-Maliki steps down as PM. Thus far, al-Maliki has stuck to his chair. In many ways, Washington’s disillusionment with al-Maliki is stunningly similar to its disenchantment with Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai. Both were US government’s hand-picked choices. Both are leaders of Islamic countries which are besieged with jihadist forces and have witnessed the US pouring in hundreds of billions of dollars and scores of thousands of its troops. The US has burnt its fingers in both these war theatres. Against the backdrop of these factors, the Indian government has very little elbow room in the current hostage crisis. The Ministry of External Affairs too is moving very cautiously even as relatives of the abductees have descended on Delhi, a pressure situation akin to the hijacking of Air India plane to Kandahar in 1999, another humanitarian crisis that confronted the BJP-led government. The MEA spokesperson, while reconfirming on Thursday the kidnapping of the 40 Indian nationals, said now the location of the hostages was known and they were being kept with people from other countries, the only piece of hard news that he gave. External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj is directly supervising the government’s efforts on the hostage crisis and the Indian embassy in Baghdad was bolstered when former Indian ambassador in Iraq, Suresh Reddy, reached Baghdad on Thursday morning to lend his expertise in resolving the hostage crisis at the earliest. But these are definitely very trying and testing times for the kidnapped persons and their families as well as the Indian government. The writer is a Firstpost columnist and a strategic analyst who tweets @Kishkindha.