So many recruiting sergeants involved in the rise of Isis

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/oct/06/recruiting-sergeants-isis-uk-united-states

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You are correct to point out that the trips of British citizens to support rebel fighters in Syria were “in keeping with Britain’s official anti-Assad policy at the time” (Not all enemies of the state, 4 October). By presenting a simplistic Manichean narrative of good democrats fighting evil dictators in a complex civil war, David Cameron, William Hague and the British media undoubtedly acted as recruiting sergeants for groups such as Islamic State (Isis) and Al-Nusra Front. Relatives of British jihadists have cited media coverage as key drivers. Those same politicians and media outlets – having learned precisely nothing from repeated cycles of supporting jihadists against secular bogeymen in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, then facing the inevitable blowback – have shifted their role from recruiting sergeant to Grand Old Duke of York: a march that led inexorably to Mount Sinjar and genocide has been ignominiously put into reverse.Peter McKennaLiverpool

• Owen Jones (Isis is turning us all into its recruiting sergeants, 6 October) rightly highlights the political roots of the rise of Isis in Iraq, and argues persuasively for the need to address those as part of any response to the Isis threat. However, he does not extend this reasoning to Syria, where the Assad regime has been far more directly connected with the rise of Isis than Maliki – providing not only the fertile soil of repression but funding through oil purchases and allowing to Isis to thrive in order to take advantage of its attacks on other opposition groups. Isis managed to establish the capital of its “caliphate” in the Syrian city of Raqqa without Assad lifting a finger.

In the short term what is needed in Syria is serious support for the groups on the ground that are not only fighting Isis but have shown in the past that they are capable of defeating it – the Kurdish YPG and the Free Syrian Army, whose allied fighters have been locked in a desperate struggle to defend Kobani. What they need first and foremost is effective weaponry. Western air power may be able to assist, but only if it is closely coordinated with the local forces. At the same time, the root cause of Isis in Syria needs to be addressed – and that is the cancer that is the Assad regime.Brian SlocockChester

• You refer disparagingly to the over-emphasis by some Muslims on how western countries set off the chain of troubles which led to Isis’s emergence (Editorial, 6 October). However, the argument has been made by a number of distinguished experts – Muslim or otherwise. Lakhdar Brahimi, the former UN special envoy to Syria, recently noted Isis was “originally and still is mainly an Iraqi phenomenon. And that is a direct result of the invasion of Iraq in 2003”. Professor George Joffe, a Middle East expert at the University of Cambridge, told the Huffington Post Tony Blair bore “total responsibility” for the rise of Isis.

Furthermore, the New York Times has reported of the leader of Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi: “At every turn, [his] rise has been shaped by the United States’s involvement in Iraq.” The article goes on to explain that Baghdadi spent five years in a US prison in Iraq “where, like many Isis fighters now on the battlefield, he became more radicalised”.Ian SinclairLondon

• During the 26 September parliamentary debate, the prime minister said that without British air strikes there was no realistic prospect of “degrading and defeating” Isis and destroying it as a serious terrorist force. While he was clear that “we should not expect this to happen quickly”, your report (6 October) that Syrian Kurds have said that US-led air strikes are “not enough” to defeat Isis forces attacking Kobani on the Syrian-Turkish border, points to flaws in the US-led strategy.

First, Britain’s decision to limit our intervention to Iraq means we are powerless to come to the aid of Kobani. Second, the prime minister and President Obama insisted that their objectives could be met by providing air power in support of local forces, and by arming them. In Kobani, local forces have been receiving air support, yet still they may succumb to the terrorists. The strategy must be therefore be adapted so that it is capable of achieving its objectives. John SlingerRugby

• The US and UK have committed not to put “boots on the ground” but, without infantry, failure is likely. T here are already 600,000 boots on the ground. Not on the feet of the poorly trained Iraqi forces who ran at the first sound of gunfire, but on the feet of the 200,000-strong Syrian army and the 100,000 strong National Defence Force that maintains local security in pacified areas of Syria. This combined force includes Alawite, Sunni, Shia, Druze, Christian, Ismaili and Armenian soldiers loyal to the Assad regime. Their effectiveness is hampered by the need to defend themselves against ambivalent western- and Saudi-funded rebel forces, many of whom have crossed over to join Isis. Supporting Syria’s battle-hardened secular army against the Islamist terrorists is the only realistic way to defeat them.Craig SamsHastings, East Sussex

• “Air strikes” sound like a reasonable and proportionate response to the threat posed by Isis, but drones, missiles, high-altitude and stealth bombers operate in virtually complete safety. The word “war” is hardly appropriate. Not only militants but non-combatants of all ages are being killed. Am I alone in my concern both for these unnumbered victims and for the moral and psychological condition of those who kill with the click of a mouse?George MillerOswestry, Shropshire