(IHS Conflict Monitor) I was looking more carefully at this map after I quoted the article next to it and realized that the Green parts are territory (especially around Palmyra) that ISIS also gained in the last year. So, the red areas are areas ISIS has lost but the Green areas are areas ISIS or ISIL has gained including a small strip next to the Lebanese border which is where they likely want to break through into Lebanon as well.
Another thing to think about is that ISIS expects at some point for ALL their soldiers to die completely defending ground and to be made martyrs to their cause to generate more fighters on into the next 100 years or so. Also, they are establishing new beach heads in Libya and other countries as well. So, even when all their territories in Syria and Iraq have been taken back by NATO and the Saudi Coalition of nations they still might be in places like Libya and Afghanistan and Yemen. So, this isn't an army tied permanently to ANY piece of land and instead sort of tied to the whole middle East from Turkey to Afghanistan and Pakistan and even into India and Bangladesh and Indonesia.
So, this is somthing to think about too regarding a long term strategy to end ISIS.
There is no winning strategy to defeat ISIS without someone to champion the rights of Sunnis anywhere they are on earth. And as long as Russia and IRan are in Iraq and Syria that cannot happen.
So, it is important to expect fighting until Sunnis have rights in Syria and Iraq to be alive which is a right they do not have right now.
The same is true of Shiites in Yemen. Houthi Shiites in Yemen because they have been armed by Iran have no rights to be alive in Yemen either because Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Muslim nations cannot allow Houthis to be armed because they are a threat to all local Sunni Governments existence.
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