Arms supplied to Syrian rebels by America and Saudi Arabia often ended up in the hands of ISIS.

An Iraqi soldier holds a captured ISIS flag in Mosul. Reuters. 

A new report says that arms provided to Syrian rebels by the US government and Saudi Arabia often found their way into the hands of ISIS. Reuters. The Conflict Armament Research group found that while many of the weapons used by ISIS were captured locally, some of the weapons were ones that were provided in support of rebels fighting against the Syrian regime. They documented 12 cases of weaponry that were purchased for those rebels by the United States that ended up in the hands of ISIS. Those weapons were either captured or were given to ISIS by the very same rebels who received them. Saudi Arabian weapons were also found in the same way. America, Saudi Arabia and Bulgaria all broke contract clauses by providing those weapons, made in the EU, to the Syrian rebels. The vast majority of weapons under control of ISIS were of Russian or Chinese manufacture and were captured by ISIS on the battlefield. 

My Comment:

This isn't really surprising at all as one of the major criticisms of our handling of ISIS is how many of our weapons ended up in their control. It was always infuriating to me to see ISIS fighters using US made weapons and vehicles on the battlefield. 

To be fair, many of those weapons and vehicles were captured during the fall of Mosul and other major military defeats in Iraq. When Mosul fell ISIS captured hundreds of vehicles and thousands of weapons and given the fact we were the major arms supplier for the Iraqi military, that wasn't surprising. Given how horribly Iraq was defeated during the early days of the war, it isn't shocking at all that ISIS got a hold of so many US made arms and armor. It is also not surprising that many of the weapons were of Chinese and Russian manufacture given Russia's involvement in the war against ISIS and the fact that both countries supplied Syria.

However, this report shows that we, along with the Saudis and Bulgarians, made things way worse than it would have been otherwise. Many of our weapons ended up in the hands of ISIS because we were supplying Syrian rebels with our weapons. Those weapons ended up in the hands of ISIS, including anti-tank missiles. Those weapons certainly helped to prop up ISIS and allowed them to last as long as they did. And given how many atrocities ISIS has committed, it means that we were at least partially responsible for how horrible Syria and Iraq turned out.  

People forget how much of a mess our training program for Syrian rebels was. To say it was incompetent would be an understatement. Our efforts to train rebels failed miserably, which is not surprising. We spend billions of dollars in Iraq and Syria and other than Kurdish forces and the Iraqi military we have very little to show for it. The Syrian "secular" militias we trained accomplished very little for the cost we paid and they were not able to hang onto our weapons. 

Why? Well the simple fact is that many of them were wiped out completely. Our efforts to train fighters did not work because we put restrictions on who they could fight. Very few people in Syria wanted to join an army that was only going to fight against ISIS and not the Syrian regime or other extremist groups like al-Nusra. That left us with tiny units that got wiped out quickly. Others surrendered their arms to terrorist armies in exchange for their lives. We wouldn't and couldn't support these rebels without risking a war with Syria so they were left to be destroyed or disarmed. 

More disturbingly is the fact that we often didn't vet these groups very well in the early part of the war. Indeed, there is evidence that the Obama administration knew that ISIS would likely get some of these weapons but did it anyways, thanks to Wikileaks. Many of those rebels did indeed turn over their arms to ISIS or took them with them as they joined them. 

I also have to say that I would like to see a similar report on who provided the weapons for the other insane army of murders and thieves operating in Syria, the al-Nusra Front (or whatever they are calling themselves these days.) Many of the cases of our rebels being disarmed or destroyed were not at the hands of ISIS, but at the hands of al-Nusra instead. Al-Nusra also likely received direct support due to their slightly more moderate views and I would be very interested to know who their backers are as well...

No matter what though, I think this new report shows the danger of providing arms to rebels in a situation like Syria. Even if we do a better job of vetting and protecting our rebels, like we did with the Kurds in both Syria and Iraq, there is a very good chance that those weapons could fall into the wrong hands. And when we don't even bother to do that than we will for sure have to reap the consequences...