Iraq/ Syria: Islamic State's Bootleg Petro-State May Prove Unsustainable

Aug 25, 2014 | Al-Jazeera
View Original

With up to $2 million in daily revenue from black market oil, the Islamic State insurgency not only holds sway over swathes of Syria and Iraq but has also begun to lay the foundations to become a small petro-state. Such is the extent of the threat posed by the network that Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on Thursday called the group “as sophisticated and well-funded as any group that we’ve seen” and “beyond just a terrorist group.”