The emergence of the Islamic State militant group as the most powerful opposition force in the Syrian civil war had the salutary effect of uniting the disparate forces in that conflict in a single purpose: defeating and destroying the still more bloody extremist group. It is ironic then that as the prospect of that defeat now appears within grasp, there is the equally likely prospect of a wider and more dangerous fight over the future of Syria and the region, a struggle that threatens to pit the West, particularly the United States and its regional allies, against Iran. And, as a side show, there is the chance of a clash between the U.S. and Russian militaries as well.

IS was a coalition of fundamentalist groups that had emerged from the disintegration of Iraq and the civil war in Syria. In 2014, it made substantial gains on the ground, and at its peak controlled as much as 45 percent of Iraq, making real their dream — and others' nightmare — of a caliphate. Those dreams reached their feverish peak nearly three years ago, on July 4, 2014, when Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, head of IS, stood at the pulpit of the 12th century Great Mosque of al-Nuri in Mosul and declared the creation of a caliphate, or a Muslim state, in land the group controlled in Syria and Iraq. Under the black IS flag, he declared a jihad to restore Islamic supremacy over the world.

Last week, as Iraqi and allied forces looked set to retake Mosul and crush the dream of an IS caliphate, IS destroyed the al-Nuri mosque and its famous leaning minaret in a final act of defiance and pique. This act of cultural terrorism — only the most recent among many — was rightly acknowledged by Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi as a "formal declaration of their defeat." Jan Kurbis, the United Nations special envoy to Iraq, added that "the destruction ... shows their desperation and signals their end."