http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/1...troops-as-isis-jihadists-close-in-on-baghdad/
Iraq urges U.S. to send ground troops as ISIS jihadists close in on*Baghdad
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Alastair Beach, Robert Tait, The Telegraph | October 12, 2014 | Last Updated: Oct 12 1:47 PM ET
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AP PhotoIraqi security forces patrol after clashes with militants from ISIS near the town of Jbala, about 56 kilometres south of Baghdad, Iraq, Saturday, Oct. 4, 2014.
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Iraqi officials issued a desperate plea Saturday night for America to provide ground troops, as heavily armed ISIS jihadists came within striking distance of Baghdad.
Conrad Black: Fixing the Middle East, for now and forever
Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Foreign Minister John Baird are certainly correct to support Canada’s traditional allies in attacking the Islamic State (IS). It is such an unspeakably odious organization that it is beyond normal political discourse and as many as possible of its active adherents should be killed or otherwise eliminated as quickly as possible. Further, anything that seems to reactivate the Western Alliance, the most successful in world history, is a good thing. It has recently fallen to a somnolent condition even less fearsome than the former “coalition of the willing,” i.e. we’ll do it if we’re threatened ourselves but otherwise we’ll just be happy with a U.S guaranty of our national security. There cannot be any debate that the Islamic State is a sociopathic, genocidal, barbarous outrage to any concept of civilization, and should be physically exterminated. Some effort should be made to reorient surviving prisoners rather than simply executing them, but it is the duty and in the self-interest of all countries to apply the most ruthless and expeditious force available to eliminate this unmitigated evil. It is to the credit of the Green party that its MP, Bruce Hyer, voted with the government, whose motives were perfectly sensibly explained by Messrs. Harper and Baird.
Read more …
Amid reports that Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham forces have advanced as far as Abu Ghraib, a town that is effectively a suburb of Baghdad, a senior local governor claimed that up to 10,000 fighters from the movement were now poised to assault the capital.
The warning came from Sabah Al-Karhout, the president of the provisional council of Anbar Province, the vast desert region to the west of Baghdad that has now largely fallen under ISIS control.
The province’s two main cities, Fallujah and Ramadi, were once known as “the graveyard of the Americans,” and the idea of returning there will not be welcomed by the Pentagon.
But were the province to fall completely into militant hands, it would give ISIS a perfect springboard from which to mount an all-out assault on Baghdad, where a team of about 1,500 U.S. troops is already acting as mentors to the beleaguered Iraqi army.
Iraqi government officials claim that while international attention has been focused in recent weeks on the Syrian town of Kobane on the Turkish border – where Kurdish fighters are still battling to keep advancing ISIS gunmen at bay – Anbar province has been on the verge of collapse.
Government forces in the provincial capital Ramadi are still holding out against the ISIS offensive. But U.S. officials yesterday warned that the city was in a “tenuous” position.
“I think it’s fragile there now,” said one senior US defence official, speaking to AFP.
“They are being resupplied and they’re holding their own, but it’s tough and challenging.”
The surge of jihadi activity has also led to speculation that the group’s operation in Kobane was part of an elaborate decoy mission orchestrated by Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, the ISIS “caliph.” Observers point out that while the capture of Kobane would not greatly increase ISIS’s military clout, the capture of Ramadi or other cities in Anbar would be catastrophic both for the Iraqi government and Western hopes of attempting to contain the group.
Most of the Euphrates valley – which runs south east from Turkey through Syria, into Iraq and towards the capital – is now under ISIS control. Were Ramadi to fall, jihadi commanders would control a vital supply chain running from Baghdad directly back to their Syrian headquarters in Raqqa. They would also control the Haditha dam, the second largest in Iraq.
“It’s not a good situation,” admitted one U.S. official.
The region of Anbar remains haunted by the ghosts of America’s 2003 invasion.
Iraq urges U.S. to send ground troops as ISIS jihadists close in on*Baghdad
Republish Reprint
Alastair Beach, Robert Tait, The Telegraph | October 12, 2014 | Last Updated: Oct 12 1:47 PM ET
More from The Telegraph
AP PhotoIraqi security forces patrol after clashes with militants from ISIS near the town of Jbala, about 56 kilometres south of Baghdad, Iraq, Saturday, Oct. 4, 2014.
Twitter Google+ LinkedIn Email Comments More
Iraqi officials issued a desperate plea Saturday night for America to provide ground troops, as heavily armed ISIS jihadists came within striking distance of Baghdad.
Conrad Black: Fixing the Middle East, for now and forever
Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Foreign Minister John Baird are certainly correct to support Canada’s traditional allies in attacking the Islamic State (IS). It is such an unspeakably odious organization that it is beyond normal political discourse and as many as possible of its active adherents should be killed or otherwise eliminated as quickly as possible. Further, anything that seems to reactivate the Western Alliance, the most successful in world history, is a good thing. It has recently fallen to a somnolent condition even less fearsome than the former “coalition of the willing,” i.e. we’ll do it if we’re threatened ourselves but otherwise we’ll just be happy with a U.S guaranty of our national security. There cannot be any debate that the Islamic State is a sociopathic, genocidal, barbarous outrage to any concept of civilization, and should be physically exterminated. Some effort should be made to reorient surviving prisoners rather than simply executing them, but it is the duty and in the self-interest of all countries to apply the most ruthless and expeditious force available to eliminate this unmitigated evil. It is to the credit of the Green party that its MP, Bruce Hyer, voted with the government, whose motives were perfectly sensibly explained by Messrs. Harper and Baird.
Read more …
Amid reports that Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham forces have advanced as far as Abu Ghraib, a town that is effectively a suburb of Baghdad, a senior local governor claimed that up to 10,000 fighters from the movement were now poised to assault the capital.
The warning came from Sabah Al-Karhout, the president of the provisional council of Anbar Province, the vast desert region to the west of Baghdad that has now largely fallen under ISIS control.
The province’s two main cities, Fallujah and Ramadi, were once known as “the graveyard of the Americans,” and the idea of returning there will not be welcomed by the Pentagon.
But were the province to fall completely into militant hands, it would give ISIS a perfect springboard from which to mount an all-out assault on Baghdad, where a team of about 1,500 U.S. troops is already acting as mentors to the beleaguered Iraqi army.
Iraqi government officials claim that while international attention has been focused in recent weeks on the Syrian town of Kobane on the Turkish border – where Kurdish fighters are still battling to keep advancing ISIS gunmen at bay – Anbar province has been on the verge of collapse.
Government forces in the provincial capital Ramadi are still holding out against the ISIS offensive. But U.S. officials yesterday warned that the city was in a “tenuous” position.
“I think it’s fragile there now,” said one senior US defence official, speaking to AFP.
“They are being resupplied and they’re holding their own, but it’s tough and challenging.”
The surge of jihadi activity has also led to speculation that the group’s operation in Kobane was part of an elaborate decoy mission orchestrated by Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, the ISIS “caliph.” Observers point out that while the capture of Kobane would not greatly increase ISIS’s military clout, the capture of Ramadi or other cities in Anbar would be catastrophic both for the Iraqi government and Western hopes of attempting to contain the group.
Most of the Euphrates valley – which runs south east from Turkey through Syria, into Iraq and towards the capital – is now under ISIS control. Were Ramadi to fall, jihadi commanders would control a vital supply chain running from Baghdad directly back to their Syrian headquarters in Raqqa. They would also control the Haditha dam, the second largest in Iraq.
“It’s not a good situation,” admitted one U.S. official.
The region of Anbar remains haunted by the ghosts of America’s 2003 invasion.
