剿滅ISIS不等于消滅恐怖主義

It is hardly news to the people of Barcelona and London, and before them the citizens of Paris and Brussels, Istanbul and Ankara, St Petersburg and Stockholm, or Nice and Berlin, that jihadis inspired and incited by Isis can terrorise their cities, even as an array of forces recaptures Isis strongholds in Mosul, Raqqa and, now, Deir al-Zor. The Islamic State caliphate, in all its monstrous vainglory, will perish. But jihadism, in all its blood-addled and doctrinal simplicity, would seem to have a fiery future.

對于巴塞羅那、倫敦的人們以及之前巴黎、布魯塞爾、伊斯坦布爾、安卡拉、圣彼得堡、斯德哥爾摩或者尼斯、柏林的市民而言，受“伊拉克和黎凡特伊斯蘭國”(ISIS)煽動的圣戰(zhàn)分子能夠威脅他們所在的城市早已不是新聞，即便各路武裝力量正在奪回ISIS位于摩蘇爾、拉卡及代爾祖爾的據(jù)點(diǎn)。這個極端狂妄的哈里發(fā)國——“伊斯蘭國”必將滅亡。但嗜血且教義簡單的圣戰(zhàn)主義似乎有一個熾熱的未來。

Attacks like last month’s on Barcelona’s Ramblas, or at Westminster and London Bridge, are not, of course, new — nor purely a tactical riposte to territorial defeat in Syria, Iraq and elsewhere. Isis may be the first modern, Sunni jihadist movement to have set up a proto-state. But it always urged its followers to use the full gamut of irregular warfare, from classic terrorism and hit-and-run guerrilla insurgency to vans and knives. The world will now see more of this as the jihadis melt back into local Sunni Arab towns and tribes, and build their global networks and regional franchises.

上月巴塞羅那的蘭布拉大道上或者威斯敏斯特和倫敦橋上發(fā)生的那類襲擊，當(dāng)然不是最近才有的——也不是ISIS在敘利亞、伊拉克等地節(jié)節(jié)敗退后發(fā)起的純粹戰(zhàn)術(shù)反擊。ISIS或許是首個建立雛形國家的現(xiàn)代遜尼派圣戰(zhàn)運(yùn)動。但它一直在號召追隨者使用各種各樣的非常規(guī)戰(zhàn)爭手段——從經(jīng)典的恐怖主義、打了就跑的游擊戰(zhàn)，到利用貨車和刀具傷人。隨著圣戰(zhàn)分子悄悄重返遜尼派阿拉伯城鎮(zhèn)和部落，并打造他們的全球網(wǎng)絡(luò)和區(qū)域地盤，世界將目睹更多的此類襲擊事件。

Getting a good sense of their numbers is hard. But it is worth remembering that the precursor to Isis, the Iraqi chapter of al-Qaeda created by the sanguinary Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was all but destroyed in 2007-09 by the US military “surge” and revolt of the Sunni tribes of central and western Iraq. Resurrected by Syria’s descent into sectarian carnage, and given new backbone by allying with the Sunni supremacist, residual power structure of Saddam Hussein’s Ba’ath party and army, Isis stormed back into Iraq to set up its caliphate five years later. Can it repeat this phoenix trick?

很難獲得關(guān)于圣戰(zhàn)分子數(shù)量的準(zhǔn)確數(shù)字。但值得記住的是，ISIS的前身——由血腥的阿布•穆薩布•扎卡維(Abu Musab al-Zarqawi)創(chuàng)建的“伊拉克基地組織”(Al-Qaeda in Iraq)——曾于2007至2009年在美軍“增兵”和伊拉克中部和西部遜尼派部落轉(zhuǎn)變立場后基本被剿滅。敘利亞陷入宗派屠殺使其死灰復(fù)燃，與遜尼派至上主義者以及薩達(dá)姆•侯賽因(Saddam Hussein)的阿拉伯復(fù)興社會黨(Ba'ath party)和軍隊殘余勢力結(jié)盟使其獲得新的主干，這股勢力拉起ISIS的大旗，在5年后殺回伊拉克并建立自己的哈里發(fā)。它能重新上演這種“重生”嗎?

The war in Syria, now in its seventh year, has made Isis — at its core, Iraqi — a much bigger phenomenon than its al-Qaeda predecessor. Yet the question goes beyond Isis. Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, the latest iteration of the Jabhat al-Nusra movement spawned by al-Qaeda, now fields one of the biggest armies in Syria.

已經(jīng)進(jìn)入第七個年頭的敘利亞內(nèi)戰(zhàn)，使ISIS(核心在伊拉克)成了一個比其基地組織前身大得多的現(xiàn)象。然而，這個問題超出ISIS的范疇?；亟M織分支“努斯拉陣線”(Jabhat al-Nusra)最新更名為“解放沙姆聯(lián)盟”(Hayat Tahrir al-Sham)，該組織如今已成為敘利亞規(guī)模最大的武裝之一。

Although much of Tahrir al-Sham’s estimated 30,000-strong force is bottled up in Idlib province in the north, it has successfully annexed most rival Salafist fighting groups, controls a long strip of Syria’s north-west border with Turkey, has a plentiful supply of suicide-bombers and demonstrable offensive capacity. Unlike Isis, as the French Syria scholar Fabrice Balanche remarks, this group “practises discretion in order to avoid antagonising locals” and, crucially, “relies more on the potency of its network than on the accumulation of territory”.

雖然“解放沙姆聯(lián)盟”約3萬多人的兵力大部分被堵在敘利亞北方的伊德利卜省，但該組織成功吞并了對手沙拉菲派(Salafist)的多數(shù)作戰(zhàn)勢力，控制著敘利亞西北部與土耳其接壤的狹長地帶，擁有源源不斷的自殺炸彈襲擊者以及經(jīng)過證明的進(jìn)攻能力。法國的敘利亞問題專家法布里斯•巴朗什(Fabrice Balanche)認(rèn)為，與ISIS不同，該組織“行事謹(jǐn)慎以避免激怒當(dāng)?shù)厝?rdquo;，而且關(guān)鍵是它“更依賴組織網(wǎng)絡(luò)的力量，而非擴(kuò)張領(lǐng)土地盤”。

The international ambitions of Tahrir al-Sham, which marked its resurgence by breaking with al-Qaeda, at least formally, are unclear. But its potential to replace Isis in the affections of would-be jihadis abroad is obvious. These so-called “homegrown” extremists are probably a greater threat than volunteers returning to their native countries, given how many of the latter were expended as jihadist cannon fodder.

宣布與基地組織撇清關(guān)系(至少在形式上是這樣)標(biāo)志著“解放沙姆聯(lián)盟”的崛起，其國際野心并不明確。但明顯的是，它很有可能在海外準(zhǔn)圣戰(zhàn)分子的追捧下取代ISIS。這些所謂“土生土長的”極端分子可能比返回本國的志愿者更具威脅——鑒于后者大都成了圣戰(zhàn)炮灰。

The outlook is doubly dark given a geopolitical context almost designed to inflame the Sunni disaffection that jihadis expertly transmute into despair.

考慮到當(dāng)下極易煽動起遜尼派不滿情緒(圣戰(zhàn)分子巧妙地將這種不滿轉(zhuǎn)化為絕望)的地緣政治背景，前景越發(fā)黯淡。

The Sunni majority in Syria feels betrayed and the Sunni minority in Iraq, historically the cornerstone of power, feels dispossessed. The two countries are broken, by the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 and then the turmoil of Arab upheavals after 2011.

敘利亞的遜尼多數(shù)派感到被出賣，而伊拉克的遜尼少數(shù)派(曾為政權(quán)基石)感到被剝奪了權(quán)力。2003年以美國為首的入侵伊拉克的戰(zhàn)爭以及2011年后席卷阿拉伯世界的動蕩，使這兩個國家陷入了四分五裂。

There is a debate about whether Syria and Iraq are beyond repair. It is merely theoretical, so long as there is no sign of any international or regional, much less internal, consensus on how they might be put back together. The main outside agents — the US and Russia, Iran and Turkey — are pursuing their own interests, heedless of how to stop this cauldron, bubbling with jihadist subculture, from tipping over.

對于敘利亞和伊拉克是否已無可救藥，目前在上演一場辯論。這個焦點(diǎn)問題只是理論上的——只要在這兩個國家如何可能重新凝聚起來的問題上不存在國際或地區(qū)共識的跡象(更別提國內(nèi)共識了)。主要的外部勢力(美國、俄羅斯、伊朗和土耳其)都在追求自身利益，不在乎如何阻止這口圣戰(zhàn)亞文化發(fā)酵的大鍋翻倒下來。

All are signed up to a greater or lesser degree to defeat Isis. Yet the US administration of Donald Trump seems to want Saudi Arabia, with its extremist Wahhabi ideology, to launch a Sunni jihad against Shia Iran. For Vladimir Putin’s Russia, Syria is the stage for its comeback as a world power. Iran and its Shia militia allies in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, is ruthlessly forging an axis from its borders to the Mediterranean. Turkey, a wobbling Nato ally and close to defunct EU candidate, is fixated on stopping US-allied Kurdish forces spreading self-government across northern Syria.

各方或多或少都希望擊敗ISIS。然而，唐納德•特朗普(Donald Trump)的美國行政當(dāng)局似乎希望信奉極端主義瓦哈比(Wahhabi)意識形態(tài)的沙特阿拉伯，發(fā)動針對什葉派伊朗的遜尼派圣戰(zhàn)。對于弗拉基米爾•普京(Vladimir Putin)領(lǐng)導(dǎo)的俄羅斯，敘利亞是其回歸世界強(qiáng)國的舞臺。伊朗及其在伊拉克、敘利亞和黎巴嫩境內(nèi)的什葉派民兵組織，正在無情地打造一個從其邊境一路延伸至地中海的軸心。土耳其——一個搖擺不定的北約盟國，已近乎失去歐盟(EU)候選國地位——關(guān)注的是阻止與美國結(jié)盟的庫爾德武裝在敘利亞北部擴(kuò)大自治。

Either these powers find some common denominator and purpose or there will be no resurrection of Iraq and Syria but, instead, a wealth of target-rich opportunity for the already virulent plague of post-caliphate jihadism.

除非這些外部勢力找到一些共同立場和目標(biāo)，否則伊拉克和敘利亞就不會獲得新生，而是將成為滋生后ISIS時代圣戰(zhàn)主義有毒禍患的溫床。