The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Martin Dempsey, said that the army of the Islamic State is fighting because of “grievances.” He made the comments this morning at a hearing on Capitol Hill:
“The nature of the threat is such that, as I mentioned, it will only be defeated when moderate Arab and Muslim populations in the region reject it. And therefore, the way forward seems to me to run clearly through a coalition of Arab and Muslim partners, and not through the ownership of the United States on this issue. And so the strategy does that,” Dempsey said when asked whether he agrees with President Obama’s plan to degrade and destroy the Islamic State.
“It seeks to build a coalition, encourage an inclusive government to address the grievances that have caused this in the first place, it applies U.S. military power where we have unique capability to do so, and over time it allows those populations to reject ISIL.”
Dempsey did not specifically lay out the “grievances” motivating the terrorists.
