Rapid Support Forces and Brutality Strategy (1)

Prepared by: Major General (R) Dr. Adel Hassan

Introduction:
The phenomenon of terrorism is considered one of the most important topics that have arisen in international and legal relations, as it is a multi-dimensional phenomenon that transcends borders. It knows no country, gender, or religion. It includes a group of complex threats and organized crime, especially in conflict zones, the presence of foreign terrorist fighters, and the presence of elements among them that spread a culture of terrorism, extremism, violence and crime. Terrorist groups around the world, the vast majority of whom are young people, are keen to leave their homes and travel to conflict areas, as happened in Iraq, Syria, Libya, and now Sudan.
Despite the threats to the international system resulting from this phenomenon, the mechanisms for confronting it and the strategies and policies drawn up to confront it have not proven absolutely successful. This is due to differences in defining the phenomenon and agreement on a concept that transcends value systems, cultural backgrounds, and national security requirements. Despite the persistent attempts at the level of regional and international organizations to develop an agreed-upon conceptual framework for terrorism, an example of which is the African Union, which presented the following definition (that terrorism constitutes a serious violation of human rights, especially the rights related to life, freedom, security, and the obstruction of social and economic development, resulting from the instability of the state. Therefore, it must be confronted in all its forms and manifestations, including terrorism in which countries are directly or indirectly involved. According to the African Union, a terrorist act is an act that constitutes a violation of the state’s criminal law and can endanger the lives of individuals and lead to death.
Terrorist acts are no longer those related to assassinations, hijacking planes, or taking hostages. Rather, they have organizations and military formations supported by some international powers, whose goal is to destroy the infrastructure of the targeted state, overthrow the ruling regimes from within, and eliminate the largest number of the population.
The new phenomenon of violence is based around the goal of adopting acts of violence, extremism, and systematic destruction, concerned with eliminating the political, social, economic, and cultural pillars and structures on which the post-independence state was built.
The concept of savagery:
According to the definition given by Abu Bakr Naji in the book Management of Savagery, he gave the book another name, which is (How to Create a Terrorist), which ISIS adopted in carrying out its terrorist operations. The book explains the idea and strategy of organizing Al Qaeda Jihad. The publication of the book coincided with the strategic transformations witnessed by the Salafi-jihadi movement. The book was banned from circulation in many Arab countries. The US Department of Defense translated it into English after US intelligence found documents and letters addressed to and from Osama Bin Laden, including chapters from this book, so American specialists took an interest in it. The Counterterrorism Center at West Point Military College translated it into English under the title Managing Brutality, and distributed it to officials in the political circles of the US government and officials in the Ministry of Defense.
Savagery is a word used by the author and means the state of chaos that will spread throughout a country or a specific region if the grip of the ruling authority is removed from it. The author means that this state of chaos will be brutal and the local population will suffer from it. The definition of managing savagery means, in brief, managing savage chaos. ISIS practiced it through the Inquisition system. Anyone who does not support them or pledge allegiance to them seizes his property and executes him.
According to Abu Bakr Naji, brutality has three stages:
The stage of the power of spite and exhaustion.
The brutality management stage.
The stage of empowerment.
Pointing out that conquest and empowerment come from abroad. One of the conditions for brutality is that weapons be spread among large numbers of people and fighters with the aim of exhausting enemy forces and ruling regimes, distracting their efforts, and preventing them from catching their breath. In addition, they bring new youth into terrorist activities, carry out specific operations, establish administrative regions, and take royalties and levies from the areas they control. As well as focusing on economic goals (oil) and trying to drag the enemy to spread, its effectiveness will decrease due to the dispersion of its efforts. It urges terrorist fighters to strike with maximum force at the enemy’s most vulnerable points. He relied on severity because, as he says, jihad is severity, cruelty, terrorism, and displacement. The first stage of jihad must be characterized by the utmost intensity and severity in order to avoid failure and introducing a state of despair into the souls of the armies. In the face of the enemy’s ferocity and its air raids on training camps and the areas they control, they had to follow a policy of paying the price, not to the invading armies, but by exposing the embassies and interests of the apostate regimes to danger. When the stage of thorn is achieved, everyone in the area of savagery receives loyalty from everyone, and then their slogan becomes (Blood, blood, demolition, demolition). He stressed the danger of leaving the political decision in the hands of those who do not fight military battles, and using the media to consolidate the management of brutality among a wide sector of the public, mastering the security aspect, broadcasting eyes, and infiltrating opponents and violators. Naji wrote, “We need to kill, and we need to do as happened with the Bani Qurayza. A policy of severity must be followed, so that if the demands are not implemented, the hostages will be liquidated in a horrific manner that spreads terror, as happened to the prisoners of Balila Airport (recently) by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) through mass executions.
ISIS brutality:
The armed group ISIS emerged from the Iraqi branch of Al-Qaeda. Its first appearance was in 2006, then it moved to Syria after the popular uprising in year 2011, and then the organization sought to spread its system of terror outside the Arab Levant region, reaching Libya, Egypt, Afghanistan, and Southeast Asia. The Sunni jihadist group known as the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) espouses a violent ideology that seeks to establish a “caliphate.” It is intellectually and ideologically affiliated with Salafist jihadist groups, and is considered the legitimate offspring of Al-Qaeda. Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi is the founder of the organization and its most important leader is Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi. He tried to attract the Syrian Al-Nusra Front to the organization, which was affiliated with Al-Qaeda, but due to intellectual and organizational differences, Al-Nusra Front distanced itself from it.
ISIS was able to control large areas in Iraq after military and security elements from Saddam Hussein’s regime joined it. His activity moved to Syria, then to Libya, southern Egypt, then to West Africa. He also had followers in the Horn of Africa and East Africa, and he tried to unite with the Boko Haram organization, which made his influence clear in the West Africa and Sahel region.
ISIS’ strategic transformation:
With the collapse of the empowerment strategy adopted by ISIS following the fall of the so-called ISIS caliphate from Mosul in 2017, there was a need to focus on the concept of the inevitability of a clash by following three basic tactics:
The first: intensifying the rate of terrorist operations while selecting new targets and areas to carry out operations.
Second: Media activity through the repeated appearance of the official spokesman for ISIS, Abu Hamza Al-Qurashi, with the aim of promoting allegations about the organization’s cohesion on the one hand, and the mobilization and mobilization of fighters, whether in the center or its various branches, on the other hand.
Third: Announcing a new strategy different from the old strategy (management of brutality and empowerment(