Ten years to the day after the U.S.-led operation against the Islamic State officially began, the United States and its NATO allies met in Brussels on Thursday to discuss the future of a mission facing increasing headwinds has.
Niger expelled the U.S. military from its counterterrorism base in West Africa this summer. Afghanistan has been largely off-limits since the Taliban came to power in 2021. And Iraq wants the Pentagon to begin reducing its personnel and end coalition operations there.
At the same time, American officials warn that the global threat from the Islamic State is growing in Africa and elsewhere, even as public attention has shifted to Russia’s war in Ukraine and widening conflicts in the Middle East.
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, who helped launch the U.S.-led coalition against the Islamic State a decade ago as a four-star general, warned allies at NATO headquarters in Brussels that the Islamic State is still a threat is that requires international attention.
“We face a number of important challenges, including the People’s Republic of China’s bullying and Russia’s reckless invasion of Ukraine,” Austin said.
“But we must not lose sight of the threat that ISIS still poses.
ATTACKS IN RUSSIA, IRAN
At the height of its power, the Islamic State claimed control over large swaths of the combined territories of Iraq and Syria. Its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, proclaimed his cross-border caliphate in 2014 from the pulpit of Iraq’s historic Al-Nuri Mosque and vowed to rule it.
Despite being territorially defeated in Syria five years ago and in Iraq seven years ago, the Islamic State has managed to carry out some high-profile attacks as it tries to rebuild itself.
Most recently, these included an attack on a Russian concert hall in March that killed at least 143 people, and two explosions in the Iranian city of Kerman in January that killed nearly 100 people.
A 19-year-old Austrian suspected of plotting a suicide attack on a Taylor Swift concert in August had sworn allegiance to the leader of the Islamic State militant group.
“It is a threat that is evolving,” NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said at the talks.
“There is an increase in lone wolf attacks. Terrorists are increasingly using new technologies and the epicenter is moving south to the Sahel, a region that now accounts for almost half of all deaths from terrorism.”
In Africa, jihadist groups linked to al-Qaeda or the Islamic State have killed thousands of civilians and displaced millions in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger.
Experts say these conflicts in the Sahel are contributing to a sharp increase in migration to Europe at a time when anti-immigrant far-right parties are on the rise and some EU states are tightening their borders.
“The Islamic State has consciously sought to shift not only its leadership but also some of its fighting power to Africa and Central Asia,” a senior U.S. defense official said.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the U.S. strategy is to ensure that the threat from the Sahel does not spill south to Ghana, Ivory Coast, Benin, Togo and other West African coastal countries.
This won’t be easy. The United States is looking for a Plan B in West Africa after the ruling junta in Niger ordered the withdrawal of nearly 1,000 U.S. troops in April.
In Iraq, under an agreement between Washington and Baghdad, the US-led coalition’s military operation will end in September 2025 as Iraq shifts to more traditional bilateral security partnerships.
The US defense official said the details were still being worked out, but “all expectations are that the footprint will shrink over the next year.” However, it is unclear what kind of US presence will remain in Iraq to support operations in Syria, which continue.
