Operation Featherweight: Month 2, Week 2, Day 1.

Following US President Barack Obama's speech on Wednesday (10/9/14) US Secretary of State John Kerry embarked on a tour of the middle-east under the guise of building a coalition against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) however I suspect his true purpose was to gauge reaction to that speech.

On Thursday (11/9/14) Kerry visited ISIL's main sponsor Saudi Arabia for a special meeting of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC). This meeting was also attended by Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon and Iraq in order to give Saudi Arabia a good look at the new Iraqi government alongside nations such as Jordan and Lebanon who are very opposed to the rise of ISIL. The meeting agreed to help support the Iraqi government, uphold United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolution 7804 (2014) against ISIL and to do their share in fighting ISIL by blocking the flow of fighters and finance and offering support to communities affected by ISIL. Saudi Arabia seem particularly pleased that they have been granted the right to supply and train the insurgents who will replace ISIL.

On Friday (12/9/14) Kerry visited Turkey which provides the main route for foreign fighters travelling to join ISIL. Following that meeting Turkey re-affirmed its commitment to fight ISIL that was made at the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) Summit last Friday (5/9/14).

On Saturday (13/9/14) Kerry travelled to Egypt which looks likely to be sucked into the fight against ISIL with Islamist militants in the Sinai peninsula beginning to pledge allegiance to ISIL and showing that allegiance by carrying out beheadings. Egypt called for the US' operation against ISIL to be intensified and expanded to include the north Africa region including Libya.

Amid all this delicate diplomacy no-one really wanted to unsettle things by doing any fighting. As a result there have been no significant gains or losses by either side on the ground in Iraq. The Iraqi government has though announced that it is going to cease using air-strikes and heavy artillery against civilian areas including ones that are under ISIL control. This seems to have been done in preparation for an expansion of coalition operations in the country because the NATO allied forces in particular have far more advanced weapons - such as Hellfire-type missiles - that are much better suited to attacking targets in heavily populated areas.

Sadly though there has been precious little indication that the US intends to expand its operations in the wake of Obama's speech. The only step they have taken so far is to announce that they intend to move their air operations from the USS George Bush aircraft carrier to an air field in Arbil province in Iraq. This has the advantage that it is a lot closer to ISIL positions in Iraq allowing aircraft to fly longer missions over their targets while reducing the need for mid-air re-fuelling. Depending on the size of the air-field it also means that the number of aircraft available to the operation can be increased by allowing nations such as the UK and Australia who cannot operate from an American aircraft carrier to join the fight.

The ideal solution would be for Turkey to fulfil its commitment to NATO by allowing the operation against ISIL to be run from Incirlik. This massive airbase on Turkey's southern border is actually shared between Turkey who use it as the base for its 10th Air Wing and 2nd Air Force Command and the US who has its 39th Air Base Wing made up of some 5000 men stationed there. However Turkey is so far refusing to allow Incirlik to be used for combat operations against ISIL despite it being very keen for it to be used for combat operations against the Syrian government.

Far from exerting pressure on Turkey to uphold both its commitment to NATO in general and its specific commitment to join the fight against ISIL the US seems more interested in focusing on the challenges of an operation against ISIL. On Friday two US Navy F-18 jets of the type being used in Iraq crashed over the west Pacific ocean. One of the pilots was quickly rescued while the search for the second has been called off now that they are presumed dead. Both aircraft were operating from the USS Carl Vinson aircraft carrier which was featured in the 2001 film "Behind Enemy Lines." The purpose of this is quite clearly to highlight the question of what would happen if any coalition aircraft were shot down or as is more likely crashed due to mechanical failure.

When coalition forces are operating over a friendly nation such as Iraq this isn't much of an issue because it is standard practise for search and rescue helicopters to shadow the fighter jets allowing them to arrive at the scene of any crash within minutes to recover the aircrew. However things become a lot more complicated when the coalition start operating over a hostile nation such as Syria. That is because if Syrian air defences are capable of bringing down a high flying fast jet they are most certainly capable of bringing down a slow moving helicopter flying at low altitude. The obvious solution of course would be for the coalition to focus their efforts on a high intensity operation against ISIL in Iraq. Then once a substantially weakened ISIL have been forced back into Syria a plan can be drawn up of how to operate in Syria if indeed there was even a need to operate in Syria at that point.

Sadly though despite the change in their Rules of Engagement (RoE) the US still seems utterly committed to keeping attacks against ISIL in Iraq at the lowest intensity possible. Since Monday (8/9/14) they have carried out just two air-strikes. Both of these occurred on Friday in the area of the Mosul Dam and they succeeded in destroying just one ISIL mortar position and one ISIL armed "Technical" truck.

On Saturday (13/9/14) night ISIL released a video on the Internet entitled "A Message to America's Allies." Very much following the format of the videos of the killing of James Foley and the killing of Steven Sotloff it showed a masked ISIL fighter with a British accent who has become known as "Jihadi John" standing behind a hostage dressed in an orange jumpsuit. That hostage was British aid worker David Haines who ISIL had threatened to kill in the video in which Steven Sotloff was beheaded. Jihadi John condemned the UK for its support for the US operation against ISIL and in particular their decision to supply arms and ammunition to the Kurdish Peshmerga who have been doing so much damage to ISIL in recent weeks. He then proceeded to behead Haines as "punishment" before threatening to kill another British aid worker - Alan Henning - unless Britain and America ended their operations.

I think the important thing to remember about ISIL is that their primary ideology is one of nihilism. This means that they view violence as an end in itself rather then a method to achieve an objective. As such it is easy to read too much into their reasons for committing violent acts. For example they may have killed David Haines simply because he was the person they'd promised to kill next.

However on Friday the UK's Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) issued a statement on behalf of the Haines family through the media urging ISIL to get in contact with them. The main message of this statement was that direct communication between ISIL and the Haines family had been taking place behind the scenes but ISIL had not been in contact for a few days. With discreet, direct communication already taking place this decision to publicly confront ISIL through the media was likely to be interpreted by ISIL as a provocation and therefore not something that a professional hostage negotiator would normally do. It seemed particularly risky because at the time ISIL had not responded to Obama's speech and were therefore already under pressure to do something violent to show that they had not been intimidated and were still committed to the fight. As such it strikes me as a very strange thing for the FCO to do.

ISIL may also have carried out the killing in an attempt to drive a wedge between the US and the UK. On Thursday - in response to a journalist's question - the UK Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond said that the UK would not be joining the US in air-strikes in Syria because the issue had already been discussed and rejected by the UK Parliament. He was quickly corrected by the UK Prime Minister's office. I should point out then that if there is any difference of opinion between the US and the UK it is most certainly not because the UK is afraid of fighting ISIL. Instead it comes from a concern that Obama has no real intention of fighting ISIL in Iraq and is instead using them as an excuse to attack and overthrow the Syrian government.

In short Obama is currently seen as being one of ISIL's main allies by granting them a safe haven in Iraq.

16:55 on 14/9/14 (UK date).