Lahur Talabaniâs journey to the forefront of the global war on terror began in the spring of 2002. It was a year after the 9/11 attacks had Americans questioning their intelligence failures in Afghanistan and the greater Middle East region. Talabani, then 26, was stationed in Ankara, representing one of the two main Iraqi Kurdish factions, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK).
Among his tasks was to help Americans cross the Turkish border into Iraqâs northern Kurdistan regionâdiscreetly. They were preparing for war. There was reconnaissance work to be done.
âAfter 9/11, we had seen signs of extremism in Halabja and Hawraman [in northern Iraq], extremists with links to Afghanistan at the time. So the Americans were interested,â he says.
It all had to be done quietly. Few could know about it, but the Americans had to bring people on board with the language skills and a nuanced understanding of the regionâs complexities.
Talabani had those, and more. He was fluent in English, Kurdish, Arabic, Persian and Turkish. He knew the Kurdish mountains intimately, owing to his many years there as a child with the Kurdish rebels in the 1980s.
In 1982, at the age of seven, he fled with his family to the mountains for shelter. They spent eight years on the move, as his father and uncles led the Kurdish rebellion against Saddam Husseinâs regime.
Clearly, Talabani was the right man for the mission.
âSo I got stuck with them,â he says, with a laugh.
Today, heâs head of the Iraqi Kurdish regionâs intelligence and counter-terror agency, Zanyariâthe Iraqi Kurdish equivalent of the CIA.
And, as a decisive showdown takes place in Mosul between an Iraqi-led coalition and the militant group Daesh, Talabani must ensure that the U.S. airstrikes donât miss their targets. At the same time, he must maintain round the clock vigilance to prevent spillover from the fighting in Mosul as well as Kirkuk into the Kurdish region.
The Making of a Strike Force
Fifteen years ago, Talabani and 15 others received U.S. training on intelligence gathering and tactical military operations that was necessary for rooting out the Jund Al Islamâand later Ansar Al Islamâfighters in the areas of northern Iraq bordering Iran.
The first operation Talabani was involved in was Operation Viking Hammer in March 2003. It was his first experience dealing with a group of indoctrinated religious extremists with tactical prowess.
âThe Americans felt it was important that before starting the Iraq war, they take pressure off the Peshmerga, so they helped us get rid of these guys, basically push them out. We captured some, some were killed and others fled across the border into Iran,â says Talabani.
But what began as a strike forceâTalabani co-founded the Counter Terrorism Group (CTG) in late 2002 with his cousin, Bafel Talabaniâhas now evolved into a sophisticated anti-terror agency.
He believes thatâdespite the criticism todayâthe Americans did foresee all that unfolded after the fall of Saddam Husseinâs regime, including the rise of Daesh.
âThey had more experience with Afghanistan and places like that before,â says Talabani. âWhen [Ansar Al Islam fighters] went across the border to Iran â they didnât all die or get capturedâthe Americans knew these guys would prepare themselves and come back and start an asymmetric war.â
Still, nothing could have prepared the Americans or their Kurdish allies in Iraq for the far more menacing dimension the conflict has taken on today.
Since 2014, when Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi declared a caliphate in Mosul just 100 kilometres south of the semi-autonomous Kurdish region, the Americans and their allies have come to realize that they are no longer fighting an armed group; they are fighting an ideology.
âAnd [an ideology] is much harder to control,â says Talabani. âWe can defeat them in Mosul, and we can defeat them in Raqqa, but we wonât win this war with military means alone.â
Military Means Not Enough
Talabani concedes that the ongoing fighting in Mosul could be âbackbreakingâ for Daesh, and that the battle for Raqqa, the groupâs other stronghold in Syria, will likely finish them off. Without a doubt, Daesh will put up a formidable defense that may drag the operation on for months.
Baghdadiâs call on November 3âin a recorded message that no media outlet could verifyâwas likely meant to boost the morale of Daesh fighters, and indicates how significant these battles are for the self-styled caliphate at this juncture.
âBoth cities are very important to Daesh. Mosul is the second largest city of Iraq, and Daeshâs last stronghold in Iraq. Donât forget their caliphate was announced from Mosul. And they collect a lot of finance from Mosulâthe city has a population of over 2.5 millionâso if they lose the city, they would lose all of that,â he explains.
Although Talabani surmises that Daesh will eventually be dislodged from both cities, he warns that its ideology will endure.
Talabani looks back on the past 15 years reflecting on vital lessons gleaned: âWe can lose Daesh, in terms of the structure, shape and form they are in right now. But as we saw with Jund Al Islam, which morphed into Ansar Al Islam, as with the case of Al Qaeda, we can try and fight these guys militarily, but they always come back stronger in another form.â
For Talabani, it is important to bear in mind that the rise of Daesh was down to a number of factors, none of which have been addressed properly as yet.
âFirst there was political system failure in Iraq. A lot of the Sunnis didnât feel they were part of the political process any longer,â he says. âSecond, the Syrian warâthe Syrian government was in trouble after the Arab Spring, and they were trying to find a way out. The international community was putting a lot of pressure on the Syrian regime so they started importing extremists from other parts of the world to make it look like they were fighting extremists. Suddenly [senior Al Qaeda operative] Muhsin Al Fadhli popped up in Syria and it was big news⊠and everyone started to believe Bashar Al Assadâs claims that he was fighting extremism. So the international community backed off a little bit.â
He adds: âSome regional countries, determined to get rid of the Assad regime, saw this and took advantage of these extremist groups, not knowing it could turn into a monster. And this animal called Daesh evolved out of this and now nobody can control it.â
Criticism
Still, Talabani has had to grapple with his fair share of critics. An alliance with the Americans at a time when the Middle East region is so polarized has generated condemnation from certain quarters. Daesh, after all, is not universally denounced and reportedly enjoys support among some Iraqis for âpragmatic reasons.â Zanyari has been called everything from âselloutsâ to âAmerican spies.â
Tallha Abdulrazaq, an Iraqi security affairs analyst at the University of Exeterâs Strategy and Security Institute, describes Zanyari as âjust another cog in the post-2003 Iraqi order of certain interest groups receiving preferential treatment.â
Zanyari is headed by Talabani, whose uncle is Jalal Talabani, leader of the PUK and former Iraqi president (2005-2014), while the Kurdistan Regional Governmentâs (KRG) Security Council is headed by Masrour Barzani, son of KRG President Massoud Barzani.
âThe reason why some view them as sellouts is because they are seen as elites who squabble over a large share of the pie whilst normal citizens have to struggle to get by,â says Abdulrazaq. âPerhaps none feel this as acutely as public sector workers, who are significant in number, who have been paid in drips and drabs due to budgetary conflicts with the Baghdad authorities.â
Talabani, who travels to Baghdad every couple of months to meet with his counterparts there, says his agency works in close cooperation with the Iraqi National Intelligence Service (INIS). This close cooperation continues, he says, âEven when there are tensions between the Kurdistan Regional Government [KRG] and Baghdad.â
âAt times, we have had a better working relationship with Baghdad than we have with our counterparts in Erbil,â he says. This was evident in 2014 when Daesh besieged the northern Syrian town of Kobane. There was disagreement within the KRG over whether Peshmerga forces ought to be deployed to support the Syrian Kurdish militias, or YPG. Eventually, Talabani brokered U.S. air support for the besieged town, and coordinated the intelligence for the airstrikes.
Aside from expressing solidarity with fellow Kurds in Syria, Talabani is of the firm belief that Syria and Iraq must have each otherâs backs because they will likely face similar threats even after Daesh as an organised group has been eliminated.
âAfter the fighting is over in Mosul and Raqqa, we will face a year or two of asymmetric threats in the region. As we saw in Kirkuk, when they sent 100 suicide bombers into the city,â he says, referring to the coordinated Daesh attacks in and around the oil-rich city of Kirkuk on October 21. âWe will see these kinds of attacks, not only in Iraq and the Kurdistan region, but we should expect similar attacks in Europe. They are already thinking about such attacksâyou are hurting them so they will try to get back at you any way they can.â
For Talabani, the real danger now is the lack of a strategy to counter the Daesh ideology.
AN IDEOLOGICAL WARFARE: Talabani says military means alone wonât wipe out Daesh, and that there needs to be a strategy to counter
extremist ideology.
âHistory will repeat if decision-makers, whether in the coalition, Iraq or regional countries, do not devise a viable post-Daesh plan. This plan must be implemented side by side with the military engagement. The group must be defeated politically as well. Right now, there is no effective effort in place to fight the ideology,â he says.
âLook at most of the towns where major battles have taken place,â he says. âMost of these towns are ruinedâRamadi, Salahuddin, etc. And Mosul will be messed up by the time itâs retaken â that means no school, no medical care, and unemployment. All these are key factors and breeding grounds for extremist groups. The government has to have a plan to put money back into these areas to provide them with job opportunities.â
Talabani says his pleas to their partners in the coalition have fallen on deaf ears.
âWe keep telling everyone, we are telling the coalition and other partners that this needs to be done otherwise it is a mistake.
What Iâm worried about is that the Iraqi government is having internal issues. Do they have the money to put back into these communities? Is the international community willing to help to give back to these communities?â he asks.
âThroughout our experience over the past 13-14 years⊠When you fight extremists, they change form and come back more aggressive. People understand this better now.â
Anti-Radicalization Programmes
Where Daesh has arguably overtaken the U.S.-led coalition is in the propaganda war. With a slick online magazine Dabiq, videos reminiscent of Hollywood action films, and prolific use of Twitter, some analysts have argued that Daeshâs communication strategists made the group appear more powerful and more numerous than it may be.
One columnist for the U.K.âs The Guardian wrote in June 2014: âIn wars gone by, advancing armies smoothed their path with missiles. [Daesh] did it with tweets and a movie.â
âDaeshâs propaganda has helped them evolve into the major role they have today. In this way, they were much more capable than the people they were fighting; we tried to counter their campaign but didnât succeed,â Talabani says. âI believe this is the work of countries, not a small group. They have been very adept at using new media to their advantage. We are now attempting to counter that.â
There is now more serious discussion on waging aggressive de-radicalization campaigns. Intelligence agencies in the West and in the region are proactively exploring methods to reach out to vulnerable youth who are susceptible to Daeshâs luring tactics. It is an âexperimental science,â but Talabani has made it a priority for Iraqâs Kurdish region, and he hopes others will give it equal importance.
âThe conditions that make young people in Europe vulnerable to Daeshâs appeal are different from those that exist in the Middle East, so the strategies have to be different,â he says.
Talabani argues that, right after the regime fell, spending time in coalition-run prisons, like Bucca and Abu Ghraib âwas like graduating from Terrorism College.â
He cites Baghdadi as an example: âHe was captured and released numerous times during Saddamâs time, and after the U.S.-led war. He had the background; he was an Iraqi first of all, he had a PhD in Shariah Law, and he preached at a mosque in Samarra. During Saddamâs time, he had issues with the regime. He was captured a few times. After the Iraq war, he was again in prison twice. And in those days, most of those coalition-run prisons were a breeding ground for terrorists, so [Baghdadi] made his networks there.â
According to Ibrahim Al Marashi, associate professor of Iraqi history at California State University San Marcos, it was in Camp Bucca that Baghdadi came into contact with Haji Bakr, the nom de-guerre of Samir Al Khlifawi, a former officer under the Baath. And it was Haji Bakr that brought Baghdadi into Daesh upon their release.
The Lure of Daesh
In mainstream media, much hype has surrounded the 150,000 Peshmerga who are fighting the ground battle for the U.S.-led forces, but there have also been reports of 400-500 young Kurds joining Daesh, egged on by rogue preachers or local Islamist parties.
âTo be honest, we have had issues with extremism in the past, so my expectation was much higher,â says Talabani. âI expected thousands of Kurds joining the ranks of Daesh, but I was wrong. A few hundred Kurds is nothing compared to the number of European men who have come here to join Daesh. I believe Daeshâs brutality affected Kurdsâ perception of the group. We thought Al Qaeda was bad, but Al Qaeda disowned Daesh because it was so brutal.â
Talabaniâs advice to European countries is to conduct a thorough study of the environment that drives young men and women to find appeal in joining Daesh.
âHere in the Kurdistan region, we have had to close down some mosques and we have arrested 10-15 preachers who were preaching extremist ideas. We still do. We control it through the Ministry of Religious Affairs,â he says.
Itâs a delicate subject, but one Talabani has had no problem tackling owing to his tribal pedigreeâhe also holds the honorific title of âsheikh,â which denotes an elevated social status linked to the Qadiri order of Islam.
MISTER COOPERATIVE: Talabani says the Iraqi Kurdish intelligence agency he heads (Zanyari) works in close cooperation with the Iraqi National Intelligence Service, despite tensions between the Kurdish Regional Government and Baghdad.
By most accounts, he has also inherited his uncleâs charisma and common touchâformer Iraqi President Jalal Talabani is still widely called âMam Jalalâ (Uncle Jalal).
Yet, having spent a decade in the U.K.âfirst as a refugee and later, as restaurateurâTalabani, with his impeccable British accent and bespoke suits, is equally at ease among Western policymakers.
The ability to fit in anywhere and everywhere, some would call this the âperfect spy.â And yet, for the Kurds who have spent the last century fighting for their rightsâand few are the leaders who did not serve as PeshmergaâTalabani is seen as having earned his stripes. It remains to be seen whether he will be able to rise above internal party politics and controversies surrounding the Kurdish role in the U.S.-led coalition.