Mapping ISIS at the Institute For the Study of War

geocurrents.info/geopolitics/insurgencies/mapping-isis-at-the-institute-for-the-study-of-war

Martin W. Lewis
(Note: This post is by Evan Lewis, not Martin Lewis.)
ISIS has proven to be as dicult to conceptualize as it has been to counteract. It has deed easy classications
and has been misunderstood and underestimated repeatedly by most of its opponents, often with disastrous
consequences. In the eort to understand ISIS, its tactics, strategies, goals, and weak points, no one is doing as
thorough and as impressive of a job as The Institute for the Study of War, or ISW. The ISW sta has conducted a
variety of research projects on conicts ranging from Ukraine to Afghanistan, but their ISIS investigations are
particularly impressive, both in their analysis and their array of detailed maps. We present here a set of ISW
maps from the last few months depicting dierent elements of the global struggle against ISIS. To read the full
ISW articles, please visit their website at www.understandingwar.org.
The rst ISW map reproduced here depicts nearly a years
worth of ISIS-directed terrorism in Europe, including both
foiled attempts and successful attacks. While the color
schemes might be unintuitive, the map conveys an
impressive amount of information. The color of each country
depicts the number of known local residents who have joined
ISIS in Syria and Iraq. Note the high level of recruitment in
France, Tunisia, and Russia (in the latter case, mostly from
the Caucasus). The explosion icons t into a four-fold matrix
of attacks, indicating whether they were ISIS directed or
merely ISIS inspired, and whether they were successful or
not. As can be seen, attacks have been most heavily
concentrated in northern France and southern Turkey.
According to the information provided, Turkey has been
notably unsuccessful in thwarting attacks. The map also
depicts changes in national security status, countries that
have been specically mentioned by ISIS as targets, and every ISIS-linked arrest on record. The concentration of
ISIS-related arrests in Turkey, England, Spain, southern France, and western Germany is noteworthy. All in all,
this map impressively depicts Europes daunting security challenges. My main criticism is purely cartographic:
most islands are not depicted as parts of the countries that they belong to.
The next ISW map, showing ISISs global strategy, is a ne
example of macro-scale cartography, arresting for its
simplicity. Unlike many ISW maps, it does not delve into
details within countries and instead uses a simple threelayer, global approach. It depicts ISIS ambitions at their full
extent rather then a realistic assessment of their present
inuence. The groups heartland is portrayed as the red
interior ring, which extends over not just Syria and Iraq but
also Jordan, Lebanon, Israel, and the Palestinian territories.
While the actual area of ISIS control within this zone is much
more conned than what is depicted, it does represent a historically coherent region. This greater Syrian area
also has profound ideological ramications; the very title of the ISIS magazine, Dabiq, refers to a town in Syria
that the group links to the culmination of human history. As noted in the Wikipedia:
In Islamic eschatology, it is believed that Dabiq is one of two possible locations for an epic battle

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between invading Christians and the defending Muslims which will result in a Muslim victory and
mark the beginning of the end of the world. The Islamic State believes Dabiq is where an epic and
decisive battle will take place with Christian forces of the West, and have named their online
magazine after the village.
The second zone on this map covers the near abroad of ISIS ideology, an area that will prove crucial to any
serious attempt to defeat the organization. Each black star here represents an ocial ISIS wilayat, a term that
conventionally denotes a province or governorate, but which in practice refers more to the ISIS strategy of
franchising and hence incorporating local jihadists. This map, from September 2015, depicts eight such
governorates stretching from Algeria to Afghanistan and from Nigeria to the Caucasus. Experts at ISW think that
ISIS will probably announce several new wilayats in the near future, based in Tunisia, Somalia, and Bangladesh,
which would represent a dangerous expansion of its worldwide jihad. The maps nal category is the far abroad
ring, which includes any country against which ISIS holds a grudge. In this region, the group seeks mainly to
spread chaos, which it has achieved with marked success in several areas.
The next map from ISW provides an interesting contrast with
the previous one by retaining a wide focus while
simultaneously showing regional details. Many of the areas
depicted as ISIS governorates are too small to be analyzed
here, but what stands out is the dense web of ISIS activity in
Iraq-Syria along with the wide distribution of small pockets of
ISIS support throughout the region. Other characteristics of
note include the band of ISIS control, depicted in red, in
Libya, as well as pockets of support throughout the rest of
northern Africa. Zones of control on this map indicate areas
from which ISIS is able not only to launch attacks but also
control territory and form rudimentary governments,
regarded as true expansions of the caliphate. The only other
control zone shown outside of the Levant and North Africa
lies along the Afghan-Pakistan border, which is surrounded
by a smattering of support territories, indicating that this is an area of potentially rapid ISIS expansion. This map
also shows surprisingly large ISIS support territories in both northeastern Nigeria and the northeastern
Caucasus, two zones far from the groups heartland. Finally, the map shows with green stars areas in which ISIS
might declare future governorates. Somalia is no surprise in this regard, as it has been a bastion of jihadism for
years, but Tunisia and Bangladesh are both relatively well-governed states that, if destabilized by a sustained
ISIS campaign, could have disastrous consequences for their respective regions.

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The next ISW map, depicting Afghanistan, is a ne example

of the high resolution and detail that characterize the
institutes cartographic program. This map of Afghanistan is
not specically centered on ISIS, but it does depict the
groups presence as ominous black gures, visible in
several scattered locations. The primary goal of this map is
to show Taliban power and inuence throughout the country,
with ISWs usual distinction of control and support zones.
What jumps out from this map is the wide swath in which the
Taliban has substantial support, although this is admittedly a
vague term, as well as the fact that this zone almost
encircles the entire country. The only large area in which no
Taliban support is indicated is the highlands of central
Afghanistan, dominated by the Shia Hazara people.
The map indicates that the main area of ISIS power in
Afghanistan lies in Nangarhar Province along the border
with Pakistan. Here ISIS ghters have been known to attack
and beheadTaliban militants. According to an October 15 article in The Diplomat:
In Nangarhar, even as Taliban and ISIS clashed, they continued ghting the government. The
clashes between them and against the government have turned Nangarhar into a volatile
province, with the Taliban dominating some parts, while others have an ISIS presence.
Thousands of families have been displaced and violence has doubled. This indicates that
although they are rivals, Taliban and ISIS could make gains in dierent regions, creating separate
efdoms, while remaining enemies just like ISIS and Al-Nusra in Syria.
Overall, the Afghanistan map gives immediate clarity to the severity of the challenge facing the besieged Afghan
government. It also highlights the diculty of rooting out ISIS strongholds, which appear to be mostly ensconced
in territories beyond the governments control. The scale and intensity of the conict can also be seen in the large
number of district centers that have either changed hands or have been attacked recently, depicted as circles of
various colors. All in all, this map illustrates a sobering but crucial theater of conict that is often overshadowed
by the struggles occurring in Syria and Iraq.

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The nal ISW map, depicting Syria, is highly detailed and

serves a particular purpose. It starts with a depiction of
Kurdish, government, rebel and ISIS territory, as well as
contested grounds, over the more populated areas of Syria.
An overlay shows the location of every observed Russian air
strike in Syria over a nine-day period. The cartographer
divides the strikes between those that can be pin-pointed
with high condence and those that cannot, also dividing the
strikes between two separate temporal windows, one from
October 27th to November 3 rd and the other from November
4th to 5 th.

This map is helpful in forming a mental image of the

geography of the Syrian conict, but more importantly for
showing the true target of Russian attacks in Syria. Both the
Syrian government and most rebels groups are largely
concentrated in the west, the area of greatest population density, while the Kurds control a thin band along the
Turkish border, leaving a huge swaths of eastern Syria largely in ISIS hands. This entire area of ISIS sway saw
only a tiny fraction of Russian air strikes, the majority of which were located in areas controlled by the al-Nusra
Front and other smaller rebel groups. (Although this map only covers a brief nine day window, the patterns
present here are highly typical of Russian airstrikes, for which ISW releases new maps regularly.) While many
news sources have reported that Russia is preferentially targeting non-ISIS ghters, seeing this pattern clearly
demarcated on a map sends a much more powerful message.
The subtlety and detail of these maps show a commitment to the kind of accurate understanding that a good map
can provide. Rather then applying a one size ts all model to mapping ISIS, ISW cartographers tailor each map
to convey specic information, and then update those maps on a nearly weekly basis. When mapping terrorist
strikes in Europe, they retain a country-based framework while employing a wide variety of graphics to depict the
varying threats each nation faces. In their two maps of global ISIS inuence, they show both the broad range of
countries under threat and the specic areas in conict, as well as the sheer spread of ISIS inuence. Their map
of Afghanistan depicts areas of both Taliban and ISIS support and control is great detail, and in so doing provide
as clear a picture as possible of the current situation. Lastly, ISW cartographers use a map of Syria to send a
clear message about Russias present actions in the region and the dierence between Russian propaganda
and the facts on the ground. Overall, this excellent set of maps will enhance the understanding anyone who takes
the time to study them.

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