The Syrian Government Cannot Immediately Replace the SDF as a Counter-ISIS Partner in Northeastern Syria

The global threat from ISIS has been contained in large part in camps in Syria guarded by US partners of the SDF.  The current Syrian government drive to take full control of Kurdish areas in Syria in a rapid and disorganized fashion puts a decade's worth of gains against ISIS at risk.  The US must act promptly and firmly to restrain Damascus and pressure it to compromise with Kurdish forces that offer the only immediately available forces able to continue to hold off the threat of a resurgent ISIS.

The Syrian government cannot immediately replace the Syrian Democratic Forces as a reliable counter-ISIS partner in northeastern Syria. The SDF performs a range of functions that require well-developed networks and military infrastructure, which the Syrian government cannot build overnight. The SDF has excellent human intelligence networks that probably provide it with an excellent understanding of the ISIS threat it faces on the tactical level. The SDF, with US-led Coalition assistance, also controlled many detention facilities that hold 9,000 ISIS detainees. The SDF had well-developed mechanisms to draw on US intelligence support and an elite counter-ISIS special operations force trained by the United States. The Syrian government cannot replicate these capabilities overnight, even though it does have deep relationships with local tribes. The government also has other priorities that compete with the counter-ISIS mission, including administering the newly-captured areas. ISIS will have a window of opportunity to rebuild itself in the currently chaotic situation in eastern Syria, and it may be able to expand its capabilities in this period. The United States must pressure the Syrian government to make several concessions that will enable Syria, the SDF, and the United States to ensure a more orderly transfer of control in northeastern Syria.

The Syrian Democratic Forces have created a formidable counter-ISIS force over the past decade by drawing on their own skills and significant US support on the tactical level. US training and financial and diplomatic assistance helped the SDF grow and strengthen over the last ten years. The United States helped train and develop guard units at detention facilities and internally displaced persons camps like al Hol, built SDF special operations forces, and honed SDF intelligence capabilities.[i] The persistent US presence also afforded the SDF access to airstrikes, technical intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance platforms, and logistics capabilities that enabled the SDF to sustain operations across a wide swath of northeastern Syria.[ii]

The SDF’s human intelligence networks are a major success story. SDF networks have effectively developed targets for SDF units to raid and destroy at risk to their lives and the lives of their families.[iii] The SDF intelligence capability is very robust; the SDF has a well-developed ability to collect, process, and utilize intelligence to prosecute targets.[iv] Regular SDF action with US forces also helped the SDF improve the “find and fix” components of the intelligence cycle.[v]

Constructing a clandestine network of informants takes years of trust-building and development and cannot be replicated overnight. Preexisting relationships between the government and individuals and groups in northeastern Syria will not necessarily translate into human intelligence assets willing to risk their lives and the lives of their families to bring information to their handlers. The Syrian government has allied tribes and human networks in northeastern Syria, but not all of these will generate actionable intelligence on ISIS immediately. The tribal networks and relationships are extremely complex. Some tribal fighters will probably sympathize with kinsmen and fellow tribesmen who are members or supporters of ISIS. Other individuals in northeastern Syria may be disinclined to immediately risk their lives for government officials whom they are not familiar with.

Some government agents will be more focused on settling scores and may give government forces false intelligence to weaponize government forces against their local foes, which could include former SDF intelligence assets. Poorly vetted informants frequently give security forces false information to secure their own ends. The government may encourage these assets to reveal former SDF informants or regime remnants, especially if the government fears that an SDF insurgency could develop or is developing elsewhere in northeastern Syria. The government—though it has relationships with and members from the northeast—will also need time to understand the operational environment and build trusted intelligence assets that can help government forces find, fix, and finish ISIS targets in a tribal community that may be inclined to protect some ISIS members.

The Syrian government will also lack the military capabilities in northeastern Syria that the SDF had, and building these capabilities will take considerable time. The transition from government control to the SDF will be a particularly delicate moment. The transfer of a given area from one military force to another is extremely challenging, even between two friendly forces.[vi] These transfers require substantial careful planning to minimize vulnerabilities during the transfer period by familiarizing the new force with the area of operations.[vii] The transfer of Deir ez Zor and Raqqa provinces from the SDF to the Syrian government was unplanned and uncoordinated due to the Syrian government‘s assault and the SDF‘s subsequent collapse.[viii] The new government forces—even if they are from the areas that they now occupy—are unfamiliar with the operational environment. Even commanders who are stationed in the areas where they are originally from will be returning to the area after a decade-long exile.[ix] These forces and their commanders will need time to orient or reorient themselves with their areas of responsibility, which will give ISIS or pro-Assad remnants time to organize themselves to resist the government.

The Syrian government also has many other priorities in the near-term that it will almost certainly prioritize over the counter-ISIS fight. The Syrian government is rapidly providing government services to northeastern Syria and rolling out its civil and administrative infrastructure, which it will almost certainly prioritize over ISIS.[x] This process will occur as government forces continue to fight SDF remnants and establish security to prevent looting and score-settling.[xi] ISIS may choose to eschew major attacks to disguise its strength and to avoid inviting counter-ISIS operations.

The Syrian government may not treat the Syrian detainees in SDF-run detention facilities as stringently as the SDF did, which could lead to releases of ISIS fighters either intentionally or unintentionally. The Syrian government will almost certainly hold third-country nationals, but indefinitely holding these individuals does not solve the issue and will still require US engagement. The SDF arbitrarily arrested many Arabs for a variety of reasons, ranging from political suppression to legitimate ISIS activity.[xii] It is extremely difficult to determine why the SDF has held specific detainees.[xiii] The Syrian government and its allies in northeastern Syria are therefore less likely to take SDF evidence of ISIS involvement seriously. The SDF likely detained innocent Arabs in the areas it controlled, but not every detainee was innocent. But government-aligned tribal may have released all the detainees at a prison in al Shaddadi without evaluating the circumstances of their detention.[xiv] Many of the detainees were recaptured, but at least 30 and perhaps as many as 120 have not yet been apprehended, and some significant portion of those are almost certainly ISIS fighters.[xv]

The Syrian government also lacks the trained guards and capabilities necessary to safely run massive facilities such as al Hol and others to the standards required for the security of the United States and its allies and partners. The SDF management of these facilities was far from perfect—though the United States called it “effective and reliable"—and the United States has at times struggled to supervise the SDF prison guards and their effectiveness.[xvi] The United States also supported the SDF at al Hol with intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) assets to observe and monitor the camp.[xvii] The Syrian government will not be able to operate even at the level of the SDF once it takes over the facilities, however, and the United States will have no opportunity to train Syrian guards, observe the management of the facilities, or augment Syrian capabilities unless Washington and Damascus negotiate a new agreement. The United States has committed significant resources to training specialized guard forces at al Hol camp and the detention facilities, and the government forces will lack all of this specialized training.[xviii]

The United States must attempt to prevent the release of ISIS detainees and ensure that the capabilities it has helped the SDF build do not collapse entirely. The Syrian president offered concessions to the SDF that he had previously rejected after a phone call with US President Donald Trump on January 19, which suggests that the United States retains significant leverage over Damascus.[xix] US efforts to secure its counter-ISIS interests in Syria would not require the Syrian government to fully back off its demand to unify Syria or integrate the SDF “as individuals,” but it may provide SDF commander Mazloum Abdi a suitable agreement to assuage SDF hardliners and satisfy key US objectives. Such a balanced approach could enable the Syrian government to unite the country with less bloodshed and also protect Kurdish communities. There are two key measures that the United States can take immediately and in the immediate aftermath of this crisis:

1. The United States can help limit the intelligence and military challenges implicit in the current transition by demanding that the Syrian army integrate SDF units into the Interior Ministry as complete divisions along with their intelligence assets and sustainment organizations. The Syrian government will be reticent to take these measures, but the United States can and should expend what leverage it has to attempt to convince President Shara to make these concessions. The United States could continue a counterterrorism partnership with these integrated SDF units over the short-term, which would enable the United States to continue its targeted operations against the ISIS threat without engaging sanctioned groups and individuals in the Syrian defense ministry that Washington distrusts. Integrating complete units will lead to a far more effective counter-ISIS force than recruiting, organizing, and building entirely new units under untested commanders and tactics. Many SDF fighters could resort to insurgency rather than join units that were trying to kill them only weeks prior, which would make a policy of integrating “individuals” counterproductive by creating more security problems.
2. The United States must continue its efforts to protect the detention facilities and prevent chaotic transfers of control, such as when the SDF abandoned the al Shadaddi facility and tribal forces reportedly released the detainees there.[xx] These efforts could include temporary local ceasefires but could also include the use of force and warning shots to prevent disorganized and undisciplined tribal levies from reaching the facilities before the Syrian government. Air assets can also continue to help support the Syrian government in assuming control and monitoring the facilities.

[i] https://media.defense.gov/2024/May/02/2003455786/-1/-1/1/OIR_Q2_MAR2024_FINAL_508.PDF; https://limacharlienews.com/mena/victory-joint-us-specops-take-tabqa-dam/ ; https://www.fdd.org/analysis/op_eds/2025/03/11/after-sdf-damascus-deal-a-spotlight-on-us-forces-in-syria/;

[ii] https://media.defense.gov/2022/Aug/05/2003050428/-1/-1/1/LEAD_INSPECTOR_GENERAL_FOR_OPERATION_INHERENT_RESOLVE_APRIL_1_.PDF; https://media.defense.gov/2024/May/02/2003455786/-1/-1/1/OIR_Q2_MAR2024_FINAL_508.PDF; https://media.defense.gov/2025/Jul/31/2003767903/-1/-1/1/OIR_Q3_JUN2025_FINAL_508.PDF; https://media.defense.gov/2025/May/01/2003702293/-1/-1/1/OIR_Q2_MAR2025_FINAL.PDF

[iii] https://media.defense.gov/2022/Aug/05/2003050428/-1/-1/1/LEAD_INSPECTOR_GENERAL_FOR_OPERATION_INHERENT_RESOLVE_APRIL_1_.PDF

[iv] https://media.defense.gov/2022/Aug/05/2003050428/-1/-1/1/LEAD_INSPECTOR_GENERAL_FOR_OPERATION_INHERENT_RESOLVE_APRIL_1_.PDF

[v] https://media.defense.gov/2022/Aug/05/2003050428/-1/-1/1/LEAD_INSPECTOR_GENERAL_FOR_OPERATION_INHERENT_RESOLVE_APRIL_1_.PDF

[vi] https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/3-90/ch15.htm

[vii] https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/policy/army/fm/3-90/ch15.htm

[viii] https://syriadirect.org/along-the-euphrates-sdf-withdrawal-marks-a-turning-point/; https://understandingwar.org/research/middle-east/syrian-government-offensive-forces-syrian-kurdish-group-to-capitulate/

[ix] https://x.com/GregoryPWaters/status/2013763518596571309

[x] https://t.me/AlekhbariahSY/193486

[xi] https://t.me/syrianmoi/28580; https://x.com/GregoryPWaters/status/2013763518596571309; https://t.me/AlekhbariahSY/193494 

[xii] https://x.com/GregoryPWaters/status/1620863800806375424?s=20; https://x.com/GregoryPWaters/status/1635699797494489091?s=20; https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/caught-crossfire-islamic-state-detention-sites-risk 

[xiii] https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/policy-analysis/caught-crossfire-islamic-state-detention-sites-risk

[xiv] https://www.thenationalnews dot com/news/mena/2026/01/21/orange-uniforms-empty-cells-and-bullets-inside-syrias-shaddadi-prison-after-the-isis-breakout

[xv] https://www.thenationalnews dot com/news/mena/2026/01/21/orange-uniforms-empty-cells-and-bullets-inside-syrias-shaddadi-prison-after-the-isis-breakout; https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/us-estimates-200-islamic-state-fighters-escaped-syrian-prison-us-official-says-2026-01-20/; https://x.com/azelin/status/2014331041213784386?s=20

[xvi] https://media.defense.gov/2025/May/01/2003702293/-1/-1/1/OIR_Q2_MAR2025_FINAL.PDF

[xvii] https://media.defense.gov/2025/May/01/2003702293/-1/-1/1/OIR_Q2_MAR2025_FINAL.PDF

[xviii] https://media.defense.gov/2024/May/02/2003455786/-1/-1/1/OIR_Q2_MAR2024_FINAL_508.PDF

[xix] https://understandingwar.org/research/middle-east/iran-update-january-20-2026/

[xx] https://www.thenationalnews dot com/news/mena/2026/01/21/orange-uniforms-empty-cells-and-bullets-inside-syrias-shaddadi-prison-after-the-isis-breakout