TAMPA — Sometime in January, if all goes according to plan, forces with the terrorist Islamic State holed up since June in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul will be hit with a double whammy — Kurdish Peshmerga forces attacking from the west and Iraqi security forces from the south.
If successful, the operation will go a long way toward proving the resolve of an army that had fled from the Islamic State forces en masse, leaving behind territory, weapons, ammunition and equipment that have fueled the terrorist group’s advances across Iraq and Syria.
The Mosul operation has been designed by Iraqis and will be carried out by them.
“It would be hard for the U.S. military to do something on this scale,” said an official with Tampa-based U.S. Central Command, who spoke on the condition that his name not be used. “If you think back to when we seized Mosul, it was a tough, tough fight, but to their credit, this is their plan.”
The Mosul offensive is part of what Centcom, headquartered at MacDill Air Force Base and overseeing U.S. military efforts in the region, calls its “counter-Daesh campaign plan,” using the Arabic name for the Islamic State, in line with Centcom’s regional partners.
The counter-Daesh plan lays out the nitty-gritty detail behind the larger fight against the Islamic State, dubbed Operation Inherent Resolve.
The operation began with airstrikes in Iraq on Aug. 8 and escalated to airstrikes in Syria on Sept. 23. Centcom commander Army Gen. Lloyd Austin III, who was recently in Iraq, has urged patience. Pentagon officials say the fight against the Islamic State could last as long as four years.
The operation faces heavy criticism as too little, too late from the likes of Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, the incoming chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
The Centcom official gave The Tampa Tribune a briefing on what’s next for the operation.
The Mosul attack plan calls for a combined force of about 1,000 troops from the Iraqi security forces and Kurdish Peshmerga to advance on Mosul and isolate it from the south. Next comes what the official called the “inside-out approach,” where Iraqi and Peshmerga troops, tribal forces and local police enter Mosul and establish pockets of control.
“Once the pockets are established and defined, then you go in and begin to clear out systematically those pockets of resistance,” the Centcom official said.
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The timing of the Mosul operation coincides with U.S. efforts to train and make more proficient fighters of the Iraqi security forces. Elsewhere in the region, efforts are underway to train other Syrians to fight the Islamic State in their country.
In Iraq, next year is “going to be all about helping the Iraqi security forces generate combat power,” the Centcom official said. The goal is to create 12 brigades of about 2,500 men apiece — nine from Iraqi security forces and three from the Kurdish Peshmerga.
Since Islamic State’s advance, the Iraqis have regenerated two to four brigades of combat power — a total of 5,000 to 10,000 troops – to help replace those lost.
Iraqi armed forces numbered about 190,000 troops before the recent rise of the Islamic State, according Centcom, which says there are about 100,000 soldiers.
In the Islamic State, the Iraqi security forces faced a brutal enemy that combined successful offensive tactics with powerful messaging, fueled by beheadings, rape and enslavement of prisoners.
They faced defensive resistance that had eroded, in large part, through the sacking of competent Sunni and Kurd commanders by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in favor of his own Shiite cronies, the Centcom official said.
When Green Beret teams began assessing the Iraqi security forces this summer, they found a hollowed-out army beset by a crisis in confidence and trust.
“In fact some tribal forces were complicit when Daesh first came in,” the official said. “They were more angry at Maliki than worried about Daesh.”
Problems also arose when Shiite troops were sent in to defend areas inhabited by their historic rivals, the Sunni.
“You add all those things together and there should be no surprise that they folded the way they did,” the Centcom official said.
But with a new, more inclusive government under Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, things are changing.
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By some estimates, the Iraqi security forces now have several operations underway at the same time — three in and around Baghdad; two in the western province of Anbar, Iraq’s largest; one in Baiji north of Baghdad, where the Islamic State was retreating from an oil refinery it secured; and one or two in the northern city of Irbil.
“That’s a pretty big step for the Iraqi security forces,” the Centcom official said. “Is Daesh still having tactical successes here and there? Are they still having spectacular things that are occurring? Absolutely. But in the aggregate, the way we are kind of characterizing it now is that the offensive for Daesh has been halted, and at best they have kind of retracted back into a defensive posture, and in some cases they are even losing ground.”
News organizations have reported on the loosening of Islamic State control in Baiji. The Centcom official reported on another example of progress this week by Iraqi forces.
“Daesh tried to mount an offensive on the Mosul Dam,” he said, the scene of a battle for control since the start of the offensive, “and between (defense forces’) contacts with us and our relations with them, they were able to organize themselves very quickly and re-enforce, and with a little bit of our fire support, they were able to repel the attacks.”
Still, the Islamic State holds vast chunks of Iraq and Syria, including Mosul and Fallujah, two of Iraq’s most populous cities, and Tikrit, a provincial capital. In addition, a pitched battle is underway for Ramadi, capital of Anbar province.
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Centcom officials said that Monday through Wednesday, aircraft and drones from the U.S. and from its partners in the anti-Islamic State coalition hit seven more Islamic State targets in Iraq, including one near Ramadi. In addition, U.S, aircraft hit 10 Islamic State targets in Syria.
Anbar is key, the Centcom official said. The campaign by the Iraqi security forces there runs from the Haditha Dam to Ramadi to Fallujah.
There is no specific timetable for the Anbar campaign. Fallujah will be particularly tough, the Centcom official said, with no concentrated offensive likely before spring or summer “because that will be one of the heavy lifts they have to do.”
Meanwhile, efforts to train the Iraqi security forces are under way.
Monday night, a small group of U.S. troops joined those in place at the Al-Asad Airbase in Anbar province to begin training Iraqi troops at the company and platoon level.
That effort will increase over the next two months, the Centcom official said, as Iraqi troops begin undergoing training at four sites — in Irbil and Anbar and in the Baghdad area at Taji and Besmaya. An additional 1,500 U.S. troops authorized by President Barack Obama will join 1,600 in place to build up 12 brigades of Iraqi
Much like the training U.S. troops undergo, it will be incremental, the Centcom official said.
It starts with the squad and platoon, then builds to company and battalion and culminates with brigade-level operations. Aside from fighting skills, the troops will learn about command and control, logistics and some aviation skills.
“What you are trying to produce on the back end is an organization that can do combined arms maneuver,” the Centcom official said.
There are no plans for U.S. troops to accompany the Iraqis into battle on the ground, the Centcom official said.
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Much of the $1.6 million in equipment and weapons requested for the Iraqis will go to this effort to ramp up the brigades. The Kurdish Peshmerga forces from the north, who have long complained they get no supplies from Baghdad, also will receive weapons directly from the U.S., such as M4 assault rifles, sniper rifles, machine guns and mortars.
“The good news is that the government acknowledges and realizes the Kurds have to be part of this,” the Centcom official said. “They were ignored and marginalized in the past.”
Learning lessons from 2011, Centcom eventually will set up “centers of excellence” to provide additional training to Iraqis so they can carry on the fight in the future. These centers will focus on logistics, maneuver techniques, and the integrated use of weapons systems such as aircraft and artillery.
Efforts to train moderate Syrian forces to take on the Islamic State in their homeland are also underway, the Centcom official said.
A task force to accomplish this is being set up in Qatar by Army Maj. Gen. Michael Nagata, head of Special Operations Command Central at MacDill, the Centcom official said. A permanent location for the task force will be selected in the next month or so.
Four training camps will be set up for Syrian fighters, one each in Turkey, Jordan and Saudi Arabia with a fourth set up in a nation that does not yet want to go public, the Centcom official said. Reuters has reported that Qatar is training moderate Syrian forces.
PHOTO: Kurdish soldiers walk near the town entrance circle heading to their strongholds in Kobani, Syria. A plan to drive Islamic State from Mosul calls for a combined force of about 1,000 troops from the Iraqi security forces and Kurdish Peshmerga to advance on Mosul and isolate it from the south. Next, an “inside-out approach” will have Iraqi and Peshmerga troops, tribal forces and local police enter Mosul and establish pockets of control. ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO