As a former soldier and war correspondent who has covered 14 conflicts, I look at all the media hoopla over tightening siege of Mosul, Iraq and shake my head. This western-organized “liberation” of Mosul is one of the bigger pieces of political-military theater that I’ve seen. Islamic State(IS), the defender of Mosul, is a paper…
Over the course of last week, attention was focused on two key points in the Middle East. These points are Syrian Aleppo and Iraqi Mosul where operations are being carried out to liquidate terrorists. In the first case, Syrian and Russian forces are carrying out an operation, while in the second one, an international coalition…
The ISIS-linked Amaq news agency released a video on October 24 that depicts a destruction of the US-made Abrams M1 main battle tank near the group’s Iraqi main stronghold, Mosul. The battle tank was reportedly blown up with the Kornet ATGM (anti-tank guided missile). The event took place at the Qarayyah crossroa, south of Mosul….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pD4O49-UE5M On October 15, the US artillery and the US-led coalition’s airpower delivered massive strikes on ISIS targets inside and outside the city of Mosul, de-facto starting a long-awaited operation to liberate the last major ISIS stronghold in Iraq. The Iraqi military, the semi-autonomous, predominantly Shia, Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), the Kurdish Peshmerga, some pro-government…
There’s no question Baghdad needs to take back Mosul from ISIS/ISIL/Daesh. It could not do it before. In theory, the time is now. The real question is the conflicting motivations of the large “who’s who” doing it; the Iraqi Army’s 9th Division; the Kurdish Peshmerga, under the baton of wily, corrupt opportunist Barzani; Sunni tribal…
Syria’s army and Hezbollah and Iranian allies are preparing for a massive invasion by thousands of Isis fighters who will be driven out of Iraq when Mosul falls. The real purpose behind the much-trumpeted US-planned “liberation” of the Iraqi city, the Syrian military suspect, is to swamp Syria with the hordes of Isis fighters who will flee their Iraqi capital in favour of their “mini-capital” of Raqqa inside Syria…
