[Centraal] Irak en IS #121

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 18:50 schreef PizzaMizza het volgende:

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Pesh?

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:00 schreef Peunage het volgende:

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500. Voor de vorm.

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:04 schreef PizzaMizza het volgende:

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Nog steeds, wtf? De Peshmerga heeft zogenaamd te weinig mankracht om Sinjar te bevrijden, maar heeft wel mankracht om een Ba'ath-stad te bevrijden?

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:05 schreef UpsideDown het volgende:

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Hetzelfde principe als die shia-strijders bij Kirkuk, niet meteen noodzakelijk maar meer een gebaar.

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:06 schreef PizzaMizza het volgende:

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Die shia-strijders in Kirkuk zijn trouwens in de provincie Kirkuk, die is niet in handen van de KRG.

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:10 schreef UpsideDown het volgende:

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Jawel, zie je dat kleine rode stipje nabij Kirkuk? Dat is het kamp van de shia-militie. Ze mogen niet in de stad zelf gestationeerd worden maar wel in KRG gebied.

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“The government sends the Shiite militia to our area without our knowledge and says ‘come fight with us,’ but how can we fight without any arms?” he complained.

Sulaiman contended that the local Sunnis would be more effective in fighting ISIS than the Shiite militia.

“We are the people of the area and know things better,” he continued. “Better than Iranian Qasem Soleimani and the savagery of the militia who displace people in the name of fighting ISIS.”

Soleimani is the head of the Iranian Qods Force who has been assisting and leading the Shiite militia in Iraq since last August.

The Sunni Sheikh claimed that the Shiite militia has not made any progress in the war against ISIS.

“ISIS has been in control of Anbar for a year and the Shiite militia has not advanced even one kilometer,” he said. “It is all about wasting money.”

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:16 schreef PizzaMizza het volgende:

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13km van Kirkuk is dat af. Niet echt KRG gebied. Dat is een militaire zone.

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:18 schreef UpsideDown het volgende:

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De facto valt dat nu onder de KRG, Kirkuk-stad ook.

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:23 schreef PizzaMizza het volgende:

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De facto is het 50% van ISIS..

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:29 schreef UpsideDown het volgende:

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Nein, de stad zelf is 100% Peshmerga controle.

De provincie zal opgedeeld worden net als andere provincies, Hawija is een Arabische stad en zal nooit bij de KRG komen, eerder platgegooid. De provinciegrenzen zijn net als de landsgrenzen willekeurig getekend.

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 22:29 schreef UpsideDown het volgende:

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Nein, de stad zelf is 100% Peshmerga controle.

De provincie zal opgedeeld worden net als andere provincies, Hawija is een Arabische stad en zal nooit bij de KRG komen, eerder platgegooid. De provinciegrenzen zijn net als de landsgrenzen willekeurig getekend.

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 23:08 schreef ChanceThePepper het volgende:

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Hawija was een gemixte stad. De naam is koerdisch van oorsprong. Over de jaren zijn de meeste niet-arabieren weggestuurd, weggetrokken, of hebben ze moeten vluchten. Daarnaast broeden de arabieren van Hawija overdreven hard. Sinds 2003 is het daar gevaarlijk geworden en eigenlijk ook gebleven. Koerden (en anderen) zullen echter het liefst Hawija plat willen zien, aangezien het symbool staat voor onderdrukking en terreur.

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Op maandag 2 maart 2015 23:08 schreef ChanceThePepper het volgende:

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Hawija was een gemixte stad. De naam is koerdisch van oorsprong. Over de jaren zijn de meeste niet-arabieren weggestuurd, weggetrokken, of hebben ze moeten vluchten. Daarnaast broeden de arabieren van Hawija overdreven hard. Sinds 2003 is het daar gevaarlijk geworden en eigenlijk ook gebleven. Koerden (en anderen) zullen echter het liefst Hawija plat willen zien, aangezien het symbool staat voor onderdrukking en terreur.

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Op dinsdag 3 maart 2015 09:21 schreef Slayage het volgende:
niet "ya allah", wordt er geroepen, maar "ya ali" en dan vinden shias het vreemd dat sunnis het vreemd vinden dat een moslim ali aanroept en niet allah

2015-03-02 Islamic State suicide attack against Iraqi convoy heading towards Tikrit

SPOILER

Om spoilers te kunnen lezen moet je zijn ingelogd. Je moet je daarvoor eerst gratis Registreren. Ook kun je spoilers niet lezen als je een ban hebt.

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Op dinsdag 3 maart 2015 10:28 schreef Slayage het volgende:

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Op dinsdag 3 maart 2015 10:37 schreef Slayage het volgende:
uitgelegd snap ik maar blijft raar, opblazen is uiteraard not done!

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The biggest offensive against ISIS so far happened without American help—but with plenty of assistance from Iran.
The Iraqi military launched a major campaign to take back a key city from the self-proclaimed Islamic State over the weekend—a move that caught the U.S. “by surprise,” in the words of one American government official.

The U.S.-led coalition forces that have conducted seven months of airstrikes on Iraq’s behalf did not participate in the attack, defense officials told The Daily Beast, and the American military has no plans to chip in.

Instead, embedded Iranian advisors and Iranian-backed Shiite militias are taking part in the offensive on the largely Sunni town, raising the prospect that the fight to beat back ISIS could become a sectarian war.

The news is the latest indication that not all is well with the American effort against the terror group. On Friday, U.S. defense officials told The Daily Beast that a planned offensive against the ISIS stronghold of Mosul had been indefinitely postponed. Over the weekend, an American-backed rebel group in Syria announced that it was dissolving, and joining an Islamist faction.

Then there was the unexpected battle for Tikrit. Over the weekend, a reported 30,000 troops and militiamen—mostly Shiites —stormed the Sunni dominated city of Tikrit, former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s hometown and the symbolic birthplace of his three decades of repressive practices against the majority Shiite population.

U.S. officials were largely left in the dark of the planning and timing of the operation, defense officials said. The Pentagon said Monday it was not conducting airstrikes in support of the Tikrit offensive because the Iraqi government did not ask for such help.

The U.S. had seen the prospect of strikes in Tikrit for a while but the timing and nature of the attack “caught us by surprise,” one government official explained to The Daily Beast.

“If this becomes a sectarian battle, we will shift to simply counter terrorism, and away from training Iraqi forces. And the coalition will come apart.”
Perhaps the most telling evidence that the coalition was not involved in planning for a potential Tikrit campaign could be found in the coalition’s air campaign against ISIS. It has been weeks since coalition forces struck Tikrit. Meanwhile, U.S. warplanes have conducted nearly daily strikes in the Mosul in preparation for an eventual military campaign.

The depth of Iranian involvement and the dearth of U.S. engagement in the battle for Tikrit suggested the coalition led campaign did little to weaken Iranian influence on Iraqi security. Two U.S. defense officials told The Daily Beast that Iranian troops were firing Iranian artillery “in the vicinity of” the Iraqi military campaign.

And there were several reports that Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the shadowy commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ overseas operation arm is also on the ground near Tikrit.

The Iraqi decision to cut out the U.S.-led coalition turned the war against ISIS in Iraq into a dual track approach—one carried out by the U.S.-led coalition another directed by the Iranians. Each has its own military strategy.

“As long as the Iranians perceive that what we’re doing comports with their objectives—which is eliminating ISIL—we’re on a parallel course there,” Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told an audience at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York on Monday.

U.S. officials have said taking back cities from ISIS will take months, in part, to minimize civilian casualties and destruction of communities. In addition, U.S. advisors are training Iraqi brigades that includes at least some semblance of Sunni representation.

But the Iranian-led approach the clearing of Tikrit is largely sectarian—with Shiite militias reviled and feared by Sunni residents. Rather than a deliberate military campaign, the forces appear prepared to pound Tikrit, hard. And perhaps because of that, there is no need for an air campaign.

There are already fears that the Iraqi effort, backed by their Iranian supporters, will decimate parts of the city, defense officials said. Such actions would have great symbolic effect and make it increasingly unlikely of mending sectarian tensions between the minority Sunnis and their Shiite-dominated government.

An advisor to U.S. government tasked with monitoring and engaging with Iraqi officials told The Daily Beast, “I think there is a great deal of joy about going into the city that fought Iran for a decade,” referring to Tikrit’s role in the seven-year war against Iran. “Imagine Qassem Soleimani is in Tikrit directing Iraqi forces in the destruction of the symbol of the former regime and the Sunni resistance,” the advisor added.

Because of that, Pentagon officials are watching carefully how the Iraqi forces carry out their campaign to rid Tikrit of ISIS, though they concede the signs are not promising.

“This is a real bellweather,” said a second defense official. “If this becomes a sectarian battle, we will shift to simply counter terrorism, and away from training Iraqi forces. And the coalition will come apart.”

ISIS has been in Tikrit since June, just after it stormed Iraq’s second largest city, Mosul, and made the local capital of its caliphate. Iraqi forces had tried at least three times to wrest control of the city from ISIS, without much success. In one instance, ISIS released photos claiming to have killed 1,700 troops in and around Tikrit.

But never has Iraq sought to seize the city with so many troops and with so much help from Iran, making this campaign it best chance of reclaiming the city.

“I don’t know if this operation is going to succeed. But I know the size and configuration has been successful in the past,” said Sinan Adnan, a research associate at the Washington D.C.-based Institute for the Study of War.

The forces face significant challenges, however: namely a well-established ISIS that will fight to retain Tikrit, its last grip in Saladin province.

“It is going to be a fight,” the advisor said.

Should the Iranian-backed forces win back Tikrit, it would mark a major psychological victory and lay the groundwork for an eventual campaign to Mosul, as Tikrit sits on the supply line route between Baghdad and the north, Adnan said.

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Op dinsdag 3 maart 2015 12:23 schreef Slayage het volgende:

waar komt dat handen en voeten vandaan dan? ik ken dat niet

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Some Sunni tribal leaders in Iraq's Anbar province who the U.S. have enlisted to fight against the Islamic State group are actually working with the Islamic State group, providing it with weapons and other materials, according to Sunni fighters in Anbar. The weapons were taken from Iraqi military stockpiles that were replenished by the U.S. and given to ISIS militants who are fighting to gain ground around the Ain al-Asad air base, where about 1,400 U.S. troops are stationed.

Sheikh Ali Hatem al-Suleiman, the leader of one of the largest Sunni tribes in Anbar, the Dulaim, is said to be working directly with the Islamic State group. Al-Suleiman has been an active opponent of the Iraqi government, especially when Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, held office.

Several other Sunni leaders from Anbar have been linked to al-Suleiman's work with ISIS, and several arrest warrants have been issued by the Anbar police. These Sunni tribal leaders are not only able to acquire weapons to give to ISIS but can also send money by working with wealthy Sunni businessmen such as Khamis al-Khanjar and Imad Mohammadi, who previously gave financial support to anti-government demonstrators in several parts of Iraq.

Currently, between 5,000 and 7,000 Islamic State group fighters from Anbar tribes are moving against the city of Fallujah, Majid Hussein, a political analyst based in Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan, said. When they will have gained ground there, they will mount a push for Baghdad, he said.

The U.S. is currently supplying the Iraqi military with weapons and is advising its soldiers on fighting the Islamic State group. But the U.S. also intends to directly arm Sunni tribes in the province and to develop a Sunni-dominated national guard made of tribesmen.

In an effort to repeat the success of the “Sunni Awakening” strategy in 2007 that funneled arms to Sunni tribes in western Iraq to stop al Qaeda, the U.S. has enlisted tribal leaders to halt the Islamic State group with American weapons. Although those weapons have yet to reach the tribes in Anbar, any cooperation between tribal leaders and ISIS will likely hinder the U.S. strategy and risk exposing Baghdad to attack from ISIS.

The U.S. State Department said the support is part of the Overseas Contingency Operations' Iraq Train and Equip Fund, which allocates money to the Iraqi military, to the Kurdish military, and to training and equipping tribal forces. As part of the fiscal year 2015 budget, the U.S. allocated more than $24 million of the fund to tribal security forces, according to State Department documents. About $18.5 million was allocated to a force of tribal fighters in Anbar recruited through a mobilization program designed by the Iraqi government.

A U.S. State Department spokesman said Friday in response to a request from International Business Times that none of the millions of dollars allocated to the Iraq Train and Equip Fund have been used to provide the tribes with equipment so far. “Since the approval of [the funds] and the apportionment of the first 25 percent of funds, we are beginning to implement acquisition packages that support these initial requests, which include basic soldier items, rifles and other weapons, and ammunition,” the spokesman said. “The United States has obtained the commitment of the Government of Iraq … to secure the equipment received from the U.S. in a fashion consistent with U.S. practices.”

The State Department also told IBTimes that U.S. Central Command and U.S. security cooperation personnel in Iraq "are responsible for performing routine and specialized monitoring of end use with Iraqi Security Force personnel. If we were to hear reports that U.S.-origin equipment is being misused or provided to unauthorized users, we would engage the Government of Iraq in conjunction with the U.S. Embassy up to the highest levels to address any confirmed issues."