Felch on the 'Known Unknowns Of ISIS and Antiquities Looting'

What a title! "Danti’s Inference: The Known Unknowns Of ISIS and Antiquities Looting" (Jason Felch November 18, 2014).

Over the last month, a new meme has spread like a sandstorm across the internet: Looting of antiquities, we’re told, has become “the second largest source of revenue” for the hated terror group ISIS. The claim is almost certainly false, as I explain below. Its provenance can be traced to a State Department-funded archaeologist who is now leading U.S. efforts to protect heritage sites in Syria.

Felch then traces the first reference to this claim to an article in Foreign Policy (Justine Drennan, 'The Black-Market Battleground', 17th October) and the source was Michael Danti ("assistant professor at Boston University and co-director of the American Schools of Oriental Research’s State Department-funded campaign to track cultural heritage destruction in Syria") whose work had earlier been endorsed in John Kerry's 'we must defend heritage' speech at the Metropolitan Museum the day before US airstrikes began. Felch then documents the spread of this 'meme' from texts written by retired brigadier general, a Texas academic, Newsweek, and quoted in Congress.

Danti’s claim was surprising for those of us who have followed the looting in Syria. The scale of looting is devastating, undeniable and relatively well documented in satellite imagery. But to date, very little reliable evidence has come to light about where those looted objects are being sold, much less the profitability for sponsors of the plunder. I’m not aware of a single object offered for sale in auction houses having been reliably traced back to the conflict so far. And past research shows that the biggest profits in the illicit antiquities trade happen far upstream from the excavators, who take a paltry share of profits compared to middlemen and dealers [but] the various groups involved in looting on the ground [...] would be unlikely to engage in such vast, laborious mining efforts if they weren’t paying off in some way.

Felch tries to follow up the sources Danti refers him to, but draws a blank. There simply is no evidence to say either way. The point is made that Danti is "hardly the first to speak beyond the available evidence", a number of us have spoken with imprecision about the link between terrorism and the antiquities trade, but in reality (as is the nature of things), "we have very little reliable data on the global revenue generated by the illicit antiquities trade, and even less on the role it plays in funding terror groups".

It is, to paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, a known unknown: we know it happens, but not much more. Claiming otherwise may in the short term bring attention to the issue of looting, but ultimately saps it of credibility – and the urgency to answer those important questions with well-documented research. It can also taint important policy decisions, as Patty Gerstenblith, chair of the State Departments Cultural Property Advisory Committee, noted in response to Danti and similar claims: “Commentators and scholars should avoid sensationalism…Exaggerated [or] baseless claims hinder rational policies to restrict trade in illegal antiquities.” This is particularly true, and troubling, when baseless claims come from a highly respected academic group being paid — and held out as the gold standard – by the State Department. When John Kerry gives a speech about looting at the Met, he is using the issue to help justify the escalating U.S. military intervention in Syria. In that context, it is more important than ever to stick to the known knowns.

This is the kind of reflexive investigative reporting that we need more of when dealing with artefact collecting and the antiquity market. Guardian, Independent, Times, are you looking?