Iraq on track to retake Mosul this year, U.S. general says - Polidicks

[quote] Iraq is on track to meet its objective of retaking the city of Mosul from Islamic State later this year, should Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi choose to go forward as planned, the head of the U.S. military's Central Command said on Tuesday. "It's the prime minister's objective to have that done by the end of the year," General Joseph Votel, who oversees U.S. forces in the Middle East, told a news conference. "My assessment is that we can meet the ... prime minister's objectives, if that's what he chooses to do." ... Although Iraqi and U.S. officials have not announced a timetable for moving on the city, a senior Baghdad-based diplomat said last month Abadi wanted to bring forward the start of the Mosul campaign to October. The U.N. estimates that under a worst-case scenario, more than 1 million people could be displaced from Mosul and another 830,000 from a populated corridor south of the city, adding to the burden of caring for 3.5 million Iraqis displaced by Islamic State's 2014 onslaught and U.S.-backed Iraqi counter-offensives. [/quote] [URL="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-iraq-pentagon-idUSKCN115254"]Source[/URL]. Ambitious and it's possible, but personally I don't think Mosul will be liberated until early next year. But I am open for Iraq to pleasantly surprise me.

The Kurds could probably liberate it, but I have zero confidence in the Iraqis.

[QUOTE=Taepodong-2;50975050]The Kurds could probably liberate it, but I have zero confidence in the Iraqis.[/QUOTE] This isn't 2014 anymore. Iraqi Armed Forces have proven this year they are a formidable force to be reckoned with.

Mosul is going to be a meatgrinder, no matter how anyone looks at it. Worst case scenario is that neither the Kurds or Iraqis can take it alone, and we get called in and participate in our first major ground operation since 2011. Just to give you folks an idea of what's going on - Fallujah alone had around 7,500+ IEDs defused. We are not talking little shitty devices either, we are talking stuff which specifically required men to go around the entire town with metal detectors, and go about defusing each and every last one of them in order to make the city somewhat safe. All of this was done under sniper fire. Small taste of what was found: [t]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cl3Q52_WAAAAge_.jpg[/t][t]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cl3Q6ffXIAAiyqZ.jpg[/t] I go mentally numb at the thought of what's waiting at towns like Raqqa and Mosul. Those are major towns which they have had access to for roughly two, if not three years now. Given how the small towns are capable of producing that much explosives, the possibilities remain endless. We might even see the possibility of several parts of the cities having tunnels dug under them, and having large caches of explosives that will be detonated to devastate any attempted invasion. If something like that is done, the possible amount of deaths inflicted on military forces could be upwards into the thousands, maybe even reach ten thousand. Fallujah alone costed the Iraqi Army roughly 953 men, with another 3500 wounded. That was a battle that only lasted [I]one month[/I]. You can bet your ass that ISIS is going to fight every nook and cranny until the last drop of blood for Mosul and the massive divide between Shiite and Sunni is not going to help considering how many Shiite militias are apart of the proposed battle plans.

[QUOTE=Taepodong-2;50975050]The Kurds could probably liberate it, but I have zero confidence in the Iraqis.[/QUOTE] The Pesh are gonna be great assets because it'll be two military forces and not a shitton of PMU and militias. But also realize the Iraqis took the cities of Baji,Tikrit,Ramadi,Hit,Haditha, and Fallujah all without Kurdish support with assistance from the US of course. Winning those battles have slowly given the ISF a lot of experience and confidence to actually fight back against ISIS very well. Hell most their VBIEDS tend to not reach their targets anymore because the Iraqis know how to ID and take one down better than they did in 2014.

I'm sure they can retake it, but can they do it without the Shiia militias or at the very least try to reign them in? There have been reports of many civilians being mistreated or even going missing in the areas held by the militia after they were cleared by the Iraqi Army/SOF

Urban warfare is hell on any fighting force, no matter how advanced they are or how well prepared they are. ISIS learned this the hard way and now the forces in Mosul aren't going to get the highly dedicated and experienced jihadists they had when they went into Kobane. I'm cautiously optimistic about the Iraqi Army's chances, they've learned their lessons and are becoming more and more effective every day. [editline]30th August 2016[/editline] [QUOTE=StrykerE;50975876]I'm sure they can retake it, but can they do it without the Shiia militias or at the very least try to reign them in? There have been reports of many civilians being mistreated or even going missing in the areas held by the militia after they were cleared by the Iraqi Army/SOF[/QUOTE]Well for a long, long time the Peshmerga have been pretty much expected to handle a bulk of the fighting and have been waiting on the rest of the Iraqis to square their shit away. When it comes down to it I think most major combat operations will be handled by those two forces rather than relying primarily on the tribal militias.