News Analysis: IS on defensive in Syria, Iraq, but expanding elsewhere worldwide

While U.S. President Barack Obama has claimed that the terror group Islamic State (IS) is on the defensive, experts say this is clearly not the case worldwide.

"We have momentum, and we intend to keep that momentum," Obama told reporters after meeting with his national security staff at the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency last week.

Indeed, IS may have taken a hit in Iraq and Syria, as it recently has lost large swaths of territory there, its recruiting efforts have stalled and its finances have been negatively impacted.

But IS is expanding and gaining strength in other parts of the globe, presenting a complex situation for the United States and other Western countries that aim to defeat the radical group, experts noted.

"IS is on the defensive in Syria and Iraq, but is expanding in Libya, Yemen, Egypt, Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere. It also is on the offensive in Brussels, France, Germany and other parts of Europe," James Phillips, a Middle East expert at the Heritage Foundation, told Xinhua.

IS staged a brutal attack in Paris several months ago that killed 130 people, as well as two bomb attacks in Brussels, Belgium last month that killed at least 30 people and wounded 230 others.

Experts said those attacks show that the terrorists have the capacity to carry out deadly attacks outside their base, and their ability to do so is on the rise.

Colin P. Clarke, RAND Corporation's associate political scientist, told Xinhua there are still numerous challenges facing the United States and its allies in trying to destroy the group.

"IS has clearly made inroads outside of Iraq and Syria, in places like Libya, the Sinai peninsula in Egypt, and more recently in South Asia, in countries like Afghanistan and Bangladesh, and is attempting to push into other areas, from Somalia to the Philippines," Clarke said.

Libya has become one of IS strongholds, outside of its bases in Iraq and Syria, where the group has been growing its strength in the latest several months. Washington is weighing options in the war-torn North African state, but still no plan has yet emerged.

With Western-led anti-terror operations focused on the Middle East, IS now operates with impunity and controls territory in war-ravaged Libya. The terror organization has a base in the coastal city of Sirte, across the Mediterranean Sea from Europe and the first place outside the Middle East.

The IS presence there has been bolstered by rising numbers of reinforcements, and analysts say the group's combatants likely now number several thousands.

While IS forces are numerically inferior to government forces, the sheer fanaticism of its cadres greatly increases their fighting power, U.S. experts said.

The potential to destabilize Tunisia and Egypt is real, as is the possibility that they could conduct terrorist attacks in Europe, using Libya as a launching point, experts said.

LEARNING LESSONS FROM THE WAR AGAINST AL-QAIDA

Phillips said the challenge is to defeat IS ideologically and militarily, with the first challenge being much tougher.

"Young impressionable Muslims, particularly in Europe, must be convinced that the IS claim that it has restored the caliphate is sheer propaganda, that it is a hell on earth rather than the heaven on earth that IS promised," he said.

In the military sphere, the United States needs to coordinate the response of many allies to deprive IS of territory that it has seized, without becoming committed to another military occupation, Phillips said.

Clarke added that there are a number of lessons to be learned from the previous U.S. fight against the terror group al-Qaida, which resulted ultimately in the defeat of its core, although remnants of the group remain and are dangerous.

"One of the most important lessons we can learn from the previous fight against IS is that the group can still be effective and highly lethal long after the core has been attenuated," he said.

"I think the U.S. is cognizant that even after IS is defeated in Syria and Iraq, we'll have to contend with its splinters and franchise groups in various parts of the globe for the foreseeable future," he said. Endit