All efforts to create a caliphate should be nulled

The argument

The argument treats the Islamic State as the factor that changed the character of the Syrian conflict rather than as one participant among many. The emergence of IS groups in Syria has escalated the conflict there to a whole new level: what began as a political insurgence against the Assad regime has become a complicated international proxy war. That transformation is what makes the group the priority, because a civil conflict and a proxy war admit of different solutions, and the second is far harder to bring to an end. The direct harm is the first part of the case. The Islamic State is arguably the most brutal group in Syria, killing and displacing thousands of civilians and multiplying unrest. But the argument's distinctive claim concerns the indirect harm, which operates through the response the group provokes. The involvement of IS is the reason the United States and other international powers became involved in the conflict, and that involvement carries costs of its own: more weaponry being pumped into the country, airstrikes from abroad, and many more innocent casualties. Each intervention intended to counter the group adds to the destruction and to the number of armed actors who must eventually be accounted for in any settlement. This is why elimination rather than containment is proposed. So long as a caliphate project remains viable in Syria, it will continue to draw in outside powers and to increase religious and political tensions in the region greatly, which in turn sustains the conditions the group recruits from. Removing that driver would not by itself resolve the original dispute with the Assad regime, but it would return the conflict to something regional actors and Syrians themselves could negotiate over. On this reading the elimination of IS in Syria is the key to ending the crisis.

Context

In ancient days the caliphate was a religious based state, an Islamic empire intended to encompass all Muslims. Within recent years terrorist group IS (Islamic State) has sought to take over territory in Iraq and Syria to form a new caliphate, but has torn apart social order and lives with their violent methods. Although the group has mostly been pushed out of Iraq, their activity in Syria is a major contributor to the Syrian crisis.

Premises

Counter-arguments

Although IS is certainly a factor in the Syrian crisis, it is not the only one or even the primary one. The crisis began because the ruling Assad regime was infringing on Syrian human rights. There are multitudes of religious and political conflicts happening in Syria; the Sunni and Shia religious groups battle, elections are not fair, the Kurdish ethnic group wants independence, and general unrest is widespread. The elimination of IS will help, surely, but it is only one problem in a large set, and won't solve the crisis at its core.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] IS is not the main factor, the Assad regime is. [Rejecting P2] Eliminating the problem of IS will not solve the other issues in Syria.