A Cyber Strategy

By Frederic Lemieux

Dr. Frederic Lemieux is Professor, Program Director, and Co-Founder of the Cyber Academy at the George Washington University. Lemieux's research has focused on policing, homeland security, and cybersecurity. He is currently conducting studies on cyber defense and intelligence sharing on cyber threats. Lemieux has also published various journal articles examining counter-terrorism, intelligence agencies, and international police cooperation.

Since December 2011, when the last American troops officially left Iraq, the members of Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) were mostly wiped out or on the run. However, the remaining AQI soldiers found new opportunities to rise again and went through a metamorphosis steered by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The violent confrontations between Al-Maliki’s majority Shiite government and the Sunnis population in Iraq, as well as the civil war in Syria, provided a fertile ground for the new organization – The Islamic State – to revive and capture vast portions of territory including cities, oil fields, and military installations.

Despite an intensive bombing campaign started in September 2014 by a United States led coalition, the Islamic State (ISIS) still remains uncontained, according to a recent U.S. Intelligence Community report. The current situation begs the question, why is the Islamic State still able to resist and continue to challenge western powers?

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