ISIS child recruitment push hints at long-term ambitions – World – CBC News

Pretty nasty stuff, but in character of ISIS and its equivalents (and reminiscent of the Kadr family):

HRW [Human Rights Watch] said that children who joined armed groups in Syria did so after enduring torture by the regime, after participating in protests, or because schooling was no longer an option.

But, according to the report, others “simply … had a desire to go to battle.”

“The images of child soldiers I’m most familiar with are out of Africa, where there’s the practice of taking young children and sort of breaking them down psychologically and remoulding them as trained killers said Michael Dartnell, a terrorism expert who teaches political science at Georgian College in Ontario.

“I’m not certain if that’s actually what is going on in Syria and Iraq right now.”

Even so, Dartnell added he wasn’t sure about the capacity for such young minds to make independent ideological choices so early in life.

While Roggio said his monitoring of jihadi social-media feeds brought up images of young ISIS supporters brandishing weapons, marching in extremist parades and hitting posters of perceived infidels with their shoes, “I don’t see them being deployed on the battlefields or into towns” as one might expect a child soldier to do.

Instead, he believes youths are considered by ISIS as being more of a long-term “asset.”

“The children aren’t disposable to them,” he said, adding that their exploitation is a means of survival for the movement.

Becker, with HRW, said that child soldiers have been shown in the past to be used in some of the most dangerous tasks, such as suicide missions.

“It’s deeply concerning,” she said. “All children in Syria are suffering incredibly from the violence there, but to put children directly into battle is just beyond the pale.”

ISIS child recruitment push hints at long-term ambitions – World – CBC News.