The History of ISIS with Richard Bulliet

As the Islamic State continues its attacks in Iraq, Syria and now France, Columbia News asked professors from a number of disciplines to evaluate the threats posed by the group. Richard Bulliet is a professor of history who specializes in the history of Islamic society and institutions.

By
Adam Piore
November 18, 2015
Richard Bulliet sitting in a brown leather chair

Q. What does ISIS want?

A. ISIS wants to dominate the Muslim world, to become the Islamic state. But in order to do so they have to destroy Saudi Arabia. And right now I think the really interesting question is what are the Saudis going to do?

Q. Can you explain that?

A. If the Saudis ignore ISIS and allow their citizens to give money and volunteer recruits to ISIS, then the world sees them as enablers of a criminal fanatic organization. On the other hand, ISIS believes in a strict form of Islam not too dissimilar from what the Saudis practice, and it also has a murderous attitude toward Shiites, a group the Saudis consider to be heretics. If they do what the West would like them to do and focus on ISIS, then in Muslim terms the Saudis would be allied with the enemies of Islam—America, France, Britain, Russia, Iran. That would undermine their authority as a dynasty that controls Mecca- Medina and sees itself as the center of Islam. So the Saudis are in an almost a lose-lose situation.

Q. ISIS calls itself a caliphate. How do Saudis view that claim?

A. According to Islamic tradition, the caliph must be an Arab and a descendant of the tribe that Muhammad belonged to in Mecca. While the Saudis are Arabs, they are not of Muhammad’s tribe of Quraysh. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, ISIS’ leader, does claim to be descended from Quraysh, however. So because of Islamic doctrine, the Saudis cannot declare themselves caliphs, and their position as guardians of the holy places Mecca and Medina makes them potentially subordinate to a recognized caliph. So I think that the use of the word caliph by ISIS is effectively a challenge to the religious authority of the Saudis. Doctrinally their success puts the Saudis in a very difficult position.

Q. What can the Saudis do?

A. They are simply keeping silent. They have not done anything substantial to discredit or to combat ISIS. The Americans, the French, the British, the Russians, everybody wants the Saudis to take action. But they don’t want to, which is undermining their status in the region. Within Saudi Arabia there have been bombings, and hundreds of people who they say are ISIS sympathizers or ISIS operatives have been arrested. But all of the actions against ISIS within Saudi Arabia have been solely to prevent subversion. Islam has been used in Saudi Arabia basically as a tool for buttressing the power of the Saudi royal family, which has absolutely no intention of giving up that power to anyone.

Q. The Taliban has also claimed a caliphate. Why are we so much more concerned now?

A. The Taliban appeared to have no ambitions outside of Afghanistan. Bin Laden, who recognized the leader of the Taliban as a caliph, did have such ambitions, but not the Taliban. And even now the Taliban seem to be a local phenomenon.

Q. What does the future look like for ISIS?

A. I don’t think ISIS can survive in its current mini-state situation for more than five years. It has little sustainable income. It’s increasingly being attacked. It could metastasize, so even if it lost its territory in Syria it might then become a sort of distributed international terrorist organization. But I think it would be less appealing in such a form because these people who are being drawn into the ISIS orbit need a territory and a figurehead. They’re attracted by the romance of recreating the caliphate. If ISIS lost its geographical base, I think it would diminish its appeal to recruits around the world.

Q. Can the Saudis continue to avoid taking sides?

A. My feeling is in 10 years’ time Saudi Arabia either collaborates in destroying ISIS or it becomes ISIS. And if it becomes ISIS, then ISIS goes from being a landlocked, poor state with very limited resources to having the dominant role in the world’s oil industry. It would make a huge difference, not just to the world economy, but to the radical message pilgrims to Mecca would take home with them every year. One might then think of a Muslim Cold War, between the Shiites lead by the Islamic Republic of Iran and a hostile Sunni world led by an ISIS dominated Saudi Arabia So the Saudis, I think, are the people who are at the center of a decision crisis, and right now they’re unable to make a decision.