dramatic music
[Hind] Why would a school be used
as a location to hold ISIS members?
[gunfire]
Last January, the SDF claimed
hundreds of ISIS militants had attacked a prison.
Human rights organizations, Kurdish officials,
they say that the prison was a risk.
Hundreds of people died.
There hasn't been a successful breakout.
[Nate] To defend the great American middle,
you have to defend their values.
[Gianna] Gen Z and millennial intellectuals
are reframing what it means to be conservative.
[Thomas] If the conservative movement is smart,
they'll make a place for them.
[Amala] What up, guys?
Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom!
We're talking about whether or not 4-year-olds
can choose their gender.
We're not gonna surrender to woke.
[cheers and applause]
dramatic music
[screaming]
[indistinct chatter]
[officers] speaking native language
We're with the federal police in northern Iraq,
not too far from a city called Kirkuk,
in an area that we know ISIS remains active in.
Today, they're targeting members who they believe
are hiding out near the riverbed.
These operations happen regularly.
But they're very dangerous,
because ISIS is going to still target and kill
both civilians and Iraqi security forces.
At its height, the Islamic State, or ISIS,
encompassed nearly 40% of Iraq
and a third of Syrian territory.
It was known for conducting and inspiring deadly attacks
well outside of the region,
in Africa, Europe, and the United States.
-[siren wailing] -[gunfire]
ISIS recruited thousands of fighters
using online propaganda
and through breaking like-minded extremists
out of prisons.
In 2014, Operation Inherent Resolve
was launched to combat the threat.
Local forces supported by a U.S.-led coalition
reduced their territory to nothing by 2019.
Former President Trump declared the end
of the so-called caliphate,
yet U.S. allies in the region continue to face off
against the remaining followers of ISIS,
who are carrying out attacks across Syria and Iraq
to this day.
In July, six officers of the Iraqi Federal Police
were killed in an attack by ISIS.
ISIS used to control all of this territory.
But it remains a strategic location for them
because they can hide out in the mountains,
and they also can use these valleys to hide as well.
So what the Federal Police does in these operations
is they just burn out the area to stop ISIS
from using them again.
[officer] Fire! Fire! Fire!
[both] speaking native language
[Hind] One of America's strongest allies
in the fight against ISIS
is the Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF.
Months after declaring the end of ISIS,
Trump abruptly announced
the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria,
and funding towards combating the group
was significantly reduced.
speaking native language
[Hind] Whilst U.S.-led training exercises
and air support continues,
the SDF argues that American disengagement
has left them vulnerable.
[officer] speaking native language
Today's test day.
Everything you've been doing
for the past 12, 13 days
comes down to this, this moment right here.
[Hind] We're at a Kurdish military base.
And these guys, members of the Kurdish-led police,
are being instructed by coalition forces.
The primary role of the U.S. in Northeast Syria
is an advisory one.
But when ISIS does attack,
then they can get involved militarily.
And that's why Kurdish officials
are so keen to ensure
the future of American forces here.
[all] speaking native language
[Hind] The SDF currently oversees the detention
of 10,000 captured ISIS militants,
mainly from Iraq and Syria.
But that number includes many foreign fighters
disowned by their countries,
essentially making the SDF
the jailers of the world.
These imprisoned militants are exposed
to further radicalization behind bars,
representing an eager army in waiting
should things go wrong.
And last January, they did.
[explosion]
[people] speaking native language
[booming]
[Hind] This footage of the SDF
fending off an ISIS attack on al-Sina'a prison
is part of nearly two hours of footage
they provided to Vice.
The terror group ISIS attacking
a prison facility in Syria.
[reporter] This morning, scores are dead
after a mass prison break at a jail
holding suspected ISIS fighters in Syria.
[reporter] This is the most serious attempted jailbreak
since the fall of the so-called caliphate.
[person] speaking native language
[Hind] It was the largest and deadliest attack
in three years, an attempt to free
around 4,000 suspected ISIS militants,
and resembled the type of prison breaks
the terrorist group was known for nearly a decade ago.
[booming]
Exactly how it happened remains unclear.
Vice News partnered
with investigative researchers at Airwars
in an attempt to reconstruct the events
of the January 20th prison break.
[gunfire]
At the time of the attack,
the prisoners were kept in these five buildings,
including one block where around 700 teenage detainees
were being held despite the protests
of human rights organizations.
Around 7:20 p.m., a group of fuel tankers
were set ablaze, putting a cover of thick smoke
over the prison compound, obscuring the attackers
from coalition aircraft.
Nearby, a car bomb attacked the main gate,
demolishing a section of blast wall,
and further south, a second vehicle rammed
into another gate, indicating the attack
was planned well in advance.
SDF prison guards bore the brunt of the attack,
with many dying within moments of the initial onslaught.
One of the administrators on guard that day
was Malak Ma'esh.
speaking native language
[Hind] When was the first moment
that you realized something was wrong?
Where were you?
[Hind] As Ma'esh shielded himself from the ISIS attack
at the prison gates, what he didn't know
was that the prisoners inside had coordinated
a simultaneous breakout.
[crowd shouting]
[explosion]
[people shouting]
[gunfire]
[Hind] Ma'esh and his colleagues fled
to the floor above.
With nowhere to run, they used
their one remaining rifle
to shoot at ISIS prisoners
trying to reach them.
[Hind] Ma'esh remained trapped upstairs
for a total of five days.
When they were eventually rescued,
their skin was blackened by an attempt
to burn them out of their hiding place.
[Hind] In total, the fighting lasted 10 days,
spreading into the surrounding neighborhoods.
[person] speaking native language
[Hind] The SDF eventually managed
to round up the majority of inmates,
but scores of suspected ISIS militants
are believed to have escaped.
121 SDF guards were killed,
along with hundreds of ISIS prisoners
and an unknown number of the children
who were detained at the prison.
In the days after, the SDF claimed
a large force of ISIS militants
had taken part in the attack from outside.
[Nawroz] speaking native language
[Hind] The SDF account of the prison break
has come under scrutiny from those who argue
that it took much fewer men to compromise
what should be a maximum security facility,
pointing to a vulnerability in the prison itself.
This British inmate was at the al-Sina'a prison
while the attack took place.
He only agreed to speak with us
if he could remain anonymous.
Other ISIS prisoners?
[Hind] None of the eyewitnesses Vice News spoke to
saw militants from outside the prison enter the compound.
tense music
Airwars analyzed the available footage,
tracking down the presence of suicide vests
typically worn by ISIS militants
when attacking targets.
From the information available,
they found no evidence of external fighters
entering the prison buildings.
They documented at least 10 external attackers
outside the walls, with reports of around
another 20 killed in surrounding neighborhoods.
All estimates are far fewer
than the hundreds claimed by the SDF.
This suggests a massive security failure
by the prison administration.
Siyamend Ali is the SDF spokesperson.
He claims the number of outside attackers was large,
but says that the prison itself
was never even meant to detain such dangerous militants.
speaking native language
Why would a school be used as a location
to hold ISIS members?
[Hind] In the three years leading up to the breakout,
Congress was repeatedly warned about security
at al-Sina'a prison in quarterly reports
from Operation Inherent Resolve.
In this footage released exclusively to Vice News,
ISIS militants in their cells at al-Sina'a prison
were brazenly planning a breakout
at least two months
before the prison break actually happened.
[prisoner] speaking native language
[Hind] Whilst the intelligence points
to a persistent ISIS threat,
the SDF response is still largely dependent
on U.S. financial support and decision-making
at the very top of the U.S. government.
James Jeffrey is the former special presidential envoy
for the coalition against ISIS
and former advisor for President Donald Trump.
You had thousands of ISIS members
in insecure locations located in northeast Syria.
-And that-- -I wouldn't call them insecure.
I would say inadequately secured.
Well, the Kurdish authorities--
[James] Because they're all-- they're all still there.
So there hasn't been a successful breakout.
This was not a major priority.
We basically did a triage.
This seemed to be less worrisome than others.
-Do you regret that? -[James] No.
Because nothing bad has happened.
There was the hundreds of people killed
earlier this year.
Uh, there was a breakout.
It failed.
Human rights organizations,
Kurdish officials,
intelligence that we've seen,
all of them say differently.
-All of them say-- -What do they say?
[Hind] They say that the prison was a risk,
that there were thousands of dangerous men,
that ISIS is known to target prisons,
that that remained a risk,
and that something should have been done about it.
I could care less about the SDF
and human rights groups
because there were 50 or 60 different complaints
about what we were doing.
It is a laundry list
of all of the things that can go wrong.
It is not a useful tool for a policy person
because all I know is they're bitching about everything.
So you go in, and you look at the commander,
and you say, okay, we got 20 minutes, commander.
What are the things you want me to do right now?
The prisons made the list for sure.
But so did other things.
soft music
[Hind] As the U.S. shifts its focus away from ISIS,
the risk of their resurgence grows,
and so does the possibility that they can rebuild
a base from which to conduct and inspire
attacks around the globe.
For now, the SDF and men like Ma'esh
will continue to bear the cost for keeping ISIS at bay.
dramatic music
[indistinct chatter]
upbeat percussive music
We're walking into the American Economic Forum,
not exactly a rowdy Trump rally.
This is where young people
who like reading policy briefs go.
You know, if you want to understand the ideas
that could reshape conservatism in our country,
this is where you come.
[Jim] More working-class voters
are ditching the Democrat party.
It turns out that working-class Hispanics
also don't like open borders, inflation,
and gender ideology.
[Gianna] Across the U.S., tens of thousands of voters
are flocking to the Republican Party,
and many Gen Z and millennial intellectuals
are capitalizing on that by reframing
what it means to be conservative
with the help of former Trump officials.
This is not the old Republican establishment
of corporate tax cuts and fighting terrorism.
Instead, these guys are talking shit
about wars overseas and big banks.
[panelist] Wall Street's like oxygen.
You're gonna die without it,
but you can die of too much of it too.
And we have overdone it.
[Gianna] This departure from the GOP establishment
is fueled by the economic concerns of young Americans
who have seen housing and college prices skyrocket.
Who are you guys? Who's making up this movement?
-Angry Americans. -Angry Americans.
Just--yeah.
I mean, I won't be as wealthy
or successful as my parents.
Most people won't be my age.
We can't afford homes.
We see people who are
taking advantage of the system.
[Gianna] One of the most popular guys here
is Nate Hochman.
He's just 24,
and his widespread political writing
has made him a kind of influencer
for the brainier side of this movement.
[Nate] Hey, dude. How you doing?
[Gianna] Tonight, he's grabbing drinks with buddies,
some of whom, like him, grew up in liberal households
and have become more conservative
than their parents.
One of the really valuable things that Trump did in 2016
was to completely bust open
the horizons of possibility
for what it meant to be conservative.
What do conservatives care about?
The family, you know, social cohesion.
And how do we actually use economics, for example,
or a cultural agenda to serve those ends?
Like promoting paid family leave?
Paid family leave, child tax credits, right?
Like, a variety of ways to sort of organize
a kind of conservative welfare state.
And is it fair to say, like, you see the value
in some government regulation
that can create sort of, like, economic equality?
Sure, yeah.
I would probably use a different word
than equality, but economic
sort of broad-based prosperity.
But is the old guard gonna get on board with that?
Like, that's what I have trouble sort of believing.
Probably not.
But there's a real desire
to sort of retire a lot of those people.
[light chiming]
[Gianna] Paid family leave and child tax credits
sound pretty liberal.
But for young conservatives like Nate,
they're a way to support
a socially conservative agenda.
[Nate] I think everyone here, more or less,
probably supports a ban on abortion,
but they also understand that a point that the left makes
is that banning abortion isn't gonna stop women
from having abortions outright.
If you really want to end abortion in America,
it has to be building an entire infrastructure
that supports children and families
more than I think American policy does right now.
I've spent time with, you know, families
who have trans kids in Texas.
They're part of the working class.
Do those families not count
in the policies that you're talking about?
Well, all families count.
We want to support families.
I think the debate over the transgender issue--
which is obviously incredibly fraught right now--
has to do with this radical shift in the culture
over the last five years or so, where we have really,
really rapidly shifted our understanding
of what gender means.
[Gianna] I keep meeting young people
who are formerly liberal,
who grew up in that environment,
who are now turning to this movement.
Why is that?
You have a lot of people
who have genuine and legitimate concerns
about any number of aspects
of left-wing cultural pieties
who know that they will encounter
serious social consequences and stigma
for even gingerly broaching a lot of these topics
around race, gender, sex.
[Gianna] And many of those young people
are now going to podcasts and YouTube
to find more skeptical perspectives
across the political spectrum.
Using the kind of ideas
and motifs of cancel culture,
that we can't have open, fair discussions
around race, gender, sexuality.
[Gianna] And in the more conservative corners,
the phrase "woke" is everywhere.
Corporate America's embrace of wokeness--
The woke indoctrination--
Not even the military is immune
these days from all this wokeness.
[Gianna] It started as a phrase
for Black political consciousness.
It's now become a catch-all term
for liberal culture issues related to gender and race.
And one media company has gone all-in
on these issues.
We're at PragerU, which is a group
that finds young talent
and develops them into conservative influencers
that rack up millions of views.
And when you're walking through the offices, you know,
you're seeing, like, a lot of 20-year-olds,
22-year-olds, 25-year-olds.
It's a super young employee base.
They target young people online
who are dipping their toes in conservative waters.
Hi, everybody, and welcome...
[Gianna] Radio host Dennis Prager founded it
more than 10 years ago,
and CEO Marissa Streit helped grow it.
While it's not an actual university,
it's a hub for conservative content
that's helped build influencers
like Candace Owens.
Their goal?
To get their message anywhere
young people consume content.
Their sleek videos capture
Gen Z eyeballs on Istagram and YouTube.
There is a big difference
between mild global warming
and catastrophic global warming.
[Gianna] Some feel more academic.
Others are flashy,
catering perfectly to teenagers.
We merge these older ideas, these conservative ideas
with a youthful audience and a youthful staff
that knows how to bring it to young people.
And that's really the secret sauce
behind PragerU.
[Gianna] PragerU's funding,
mostly from conservative donors,
went from $11 million in 2017
to $55 million last year.
They're now investing
in their youngest viewers.
What happened in her homeland that made Ayn Rand
need to escape and move to the USA?
The rise of communism.
That is correct. It was the Communist takeover.
We've really widened the type of content that we make.
So now we start making content for 4-year-olds
all the way to 104 years old.
We bring alternative solutions and perspectives on things.
Every time the left claims that the right
is a journey into the future
of Handmaid's Tale here in America
is when we garner a larger audience.
What role does, you know, PragerU,
organizations like this, play
in this sort of new conservatism?
Incubator.
We can identify young, talented individuals,
and we can turn them into new role models for our society.
[Gianna] We got to see this firsthand
as Marissa and her staff judged eager Zoomers
vying to be PragerU's next star.
I think I would make
a wonderful PragerU personality
because I've really been on the front lines
the past three years on this college campus.
I've been a TikToker, making conservative content
over there for, like, a year and a half now.
And I've been banned nine times.
I don't quite understand her story,
like, her personal story.
You know, she talked a little bit
about being banned,
but everybody's being banned.
Yeah, it's great when they have the story day one,
but it's not always an immediate, like,
you know, deal breaker,
because we can build it out of them.
-So... -Yeah.
[Gianna] It seems like the fastest way to stardom
here is getting ostracized by liberals,
AKA canceled,
or disillusioned by left-wing politics.
And that's exactly what happened to Amala Ekpunobi,
a 22-year-old who, up until a few years ago,
was a liberal teen activist.
After posting videos on social
about her new conservative views,
she went viral and caught Marissa's eye.
[Amala] We're talking Keke Palmer and gender theory.
soft music
Four-year-old trans kid.
Yo, yo, yo. What up, guys?
Unapologetic live.
I'm your host, Amala Ekpunobi.
Taylor's in the producer's bay.
Is a new army school getting real woke?
[Gianna] What is it about that sort of, like, woke generation
or woke movement that drives you nuts?
The fact that it just takes people
and boils them down to what are really superficial
identity characteristics.
So much of my work when I was on the left
was just revolving around my race, being a female.
It completely dictated everything I did
as a young person.
So now that I'm seeing other young people
who are being subjected to the same narrative that I got,
I go hard on that one, just to try and help
and give a different perspective
that maybe saves them from believing
that victimhood mentality.
And what would be an example of a video
that you would do on one of those subjects?
I could talk about how affirmative action
harms everybody.
What you are doing is essentially
"fixing" past discrimination with present discrimination.
And the people who are non-people of color
watching these people get to look at them
and go, "Well, I don't know if she got that job
because of who she is or because of what she's done."
And it sews seeds of mistrust all over.
How do you think this kind of new wave of young conservatism
will change the political landscape?
I just think we're gonna see
a lot more young people come to conservatism
before they come to progressivism.
The only reason that people don't do that now
is because they have an idea of what it means
to be a conservative that's not true at all.
[Gianna] While the culture wars often seem pretty ridiculous,
they do tap into the anger folks feel toward people
they see as "elite."
There's a real shift that shows Democrats have started
to do way better among folks with a college degree
than without one.
Thomas Frank has written extensively
on the shift among Democrats in the '80s,
from being a party of the working class
to a party of the highly educated.
Young people are the lowest-hanging fruit
for liberals, or they should be.
But where are liberals kind of screwing up,
to where some of these young people aren't?
You know, I am a liberal, right?
And I vote-- I vote for Democrats.
And I'm pretty far to the left, right?
And there came a point
when I just...
I got sick of righteousness.
I got fucking sick of righteousness.
I couldn't stand it anymore.
-I-- -What specifically was it?
You know those yard signs that would say,
"In this house, we believe..."
And then they have a list of causes.
Like science.
"Science is real" is one of them.
"Black Lives Matter" is one of them.
I would look at these signs, and I'd be like,
why do these signs irritate me?
I agree with everything on them.
And I thought about it for a while, and I'm like,
because they've left one cause out,
and that's anything having to do with labor,
anything having to do with work,
anything having to do with economics.
Look, this liberalism has evolved
into a movement of scolding
that just absolutely rubs people the wrong way.
That's not how you build a movement.
You don't just exclude people off the bat for being wrong.
I mean, that's very satisfying.
But it will--it's poison to a left-wing movement.
It's--that poison feels like it's everywhere.
And maybe that's media, maybe it's not.
But there are a lot of people being canceled.
There are a lot of people being scolded.
And I wonder where those people are going.
I mean, they're going to one of two places.
They become apolitical, or they--
I mean, if the conservative movement is smart,
they'll make a place for them.
What we are missing in this country
is a traditional working-class left.
And so what fills that space?
Well, one thing is the culture wars.
[Gianna] Young political stars like Ron DeSantis and JD Vance
are now on the road testing talking points.
The formula for now is to take on big business
in the name of culture to make more Americans see
the culture wars as crucial for the country's survival.
[crowd chanting indistinctly]
[JD] Thank you. Thank you.
We do not have to live like this.
We do not have to let the Chinese steal
our manufacturing base.
We do not have to let the pharmaceutical industry
force a product on us in order for us to get a job.
[cheers and applause]
No movement would succeed if it didn't have a good reason,
if it didn't answer something
that was a deep need that people have.
It's all based on this mind virus
called woke ideology.
That is what's infecting all these different institutions.
What is that link between class war and culture war?
The culture wars are endlessly amusing
because they give you this feeling of persecution,
that you, the average American,
your values are being insulted by TV,
and they can be invented constantly.
[Ron] We will fight woke in the classroom.
We will fight woke in businesses.
We will fight woke in government agencies.
We're not gonna surrender to woke.
We are gonna stand,
and we're gonna keep our country free.
[cheers and applause]
tense music