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Iraq
Iraq Rebels Stall North of Baghdad
2014-06-15
This is the NYT take on the ISIL advance.
BAGHDAD -- A rebel juggernaut that captured Iraq's second-largest city and raced nearly 200 miles south in three days, raising fears of an imminent assault on Baghdad, stalled for a second day on Saturday about 60 miles north of the capital, leaving residents bracing for a siege that so far has not happened.
If the ISIL is as loosely organized and as thin on logistics as some are saying they may have hit their peak alright. Was their plan a lightning strike and hope to panic everyone to abandoning Baghdad?
While some Baghdad residents scrambled to leave, hoarded food or rushed to join auxiliary militias to defend the city, the militants of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria and their allies halted their advance within a two-hour drive, and there was no indication that they were seeking to push into Baghdad proper.
Would they want Baghdad? If they have most of the Sunni areas is that enough for them? Dare the Iraqi army to regroup and come back at them?
The rebel leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who had boasted that he would soon take the capital and press on to the Shiite heartland in southern Iraq, fell silent as his followers worked to consolidate their gains in predominantly Sunni parts of the country, instead of trying to fight their way through more heavily defended, Shiite-dominated areas.

There were reports of fresh clashes in Dujail, Ishaqi and Dhuluiya in Salahuddin Province, just north of Baghdad, as newly armed Shiite militias surged to confront the largely Sunni insurgents. However, there did not appear to have been any decisive engagements between the insurgents and the Iraqi military, and there was no clear evidence to support an Iraqi general's claim on Saturday that the Iraqi Army had rolled the militants back in those towns.

The Iraqi authorities used the breather to recruit citizens to reinforce the country's beleaguered military, while worried Baghdad residents began to stockpile essentials, sending prices skyrocketing on Saturday, the end of the Iraqi weekend. Cooking gas quadrupled in price, to about $20 on Saturday from about $5 on Thursday for a 35-pound container. The dollar, normally stable here, spiked about 5 percent overnight. And the price of potatoes increased sixfold, to about $4.5o a pound.

A military spokesman, Gen. Qassim Atta, said government forces had reclaimed ground in the northern provinces of Salahuddin, Diyala and Nineveh, and insisted the capital was safe.

"The security in Baghdad is 100 percent stable," he said. "The majority of Salahuddin Province has been regained. The morale of the security forces is very high."
Sure, Qassim, and I'll believe you when you do a presser in Diyala...


Posted by:Steve White

#8  I'm not so sure this will go anywhere. In Syria yes, this will boost their efforts tremendously. But I see ISIL pulling back with all their new, shiny equipment in a week or two. In hindsight that may have been the plan all along, just they saw the Iraqi's flee Mosul. Then it was kind of a feeding frenzy for everything not nailed down.

But looking on the bright side, at least they know how to use the equipment.
Posted by: Charles   2014-06-15 12:31  

#7  Hmmm, can I suppose out loud that maybe the empty suit's speech to West Point in which he essentially said the US will not use their military for anything was a green light for all of these people to move forward in Iraq?

Seems to me a lot of things are happening all at once on the heels of that pussification of US foreign policy/national defense posture.

So which do you want? The Bush Doctrine or the Empty Suit Doctrine?
Posted by: Bill Clinton   2014-06-15 12:01  

#6  He's eating
Posted by: Shipman   2014-06-15 11:56  

#5  Looks like it's gonna be another protracted proxy war similar to Syria with Iran backing one faction and Soddies backing another. Should keep 'em busy for a while anyway.

But I notice that John McCain has been strangely silent lately. What's up with that?
Posted by: Abu Uluque   2014-06-15 11:05  

#4  I'm sure anything they need (except boots) has been dropped by the Iraqi military.
Posted by: bbrewer126   2014-06-15 09:04  

#3  I don't know what kinda supply line these guys use, if they have even a very primitive one, (instead of foraging) they likely have out run it. Not sure what they need that they can't get locally tho. Any insight here would be appreciated.

Remember is old saying:
Amateur think of tactics, professionals think of logistics, the survivors seek quality cover.

Actually not old, I just made it up a minute ago.
(I think)
Posted by: Shipman   2014-06-15 05:45  

#2  Digging in, awaiting follow on. Pretty long movement over the last week, maybe time take a blow, to do a little joyful screaming and wait for the stragglers to come dragging in.
Posted by: Shipman   2014-06-15 05:37  

#1  If they have most of the Sunni areas is that enough for them?

The area that ISIS/ISIL wants contains Arabs whose brand of Islam matches that in Saudi Arabia. It spans parts of Syria, parts of Iraq and parts of Saudi Arabia. ISIS/ISIL may have got what they wanted.

Now their Baathist allies may not be satisfied with that. First check.

Saudi Arabia has a history of setting up proxies to destroy their enemies after which the Saudis turn on their proxies and destroy them.

Dare the Iraqi army to regroup and come back at them?

Think back to the surge and what it took to take back Fallujah. Do you think that al-Maliki's corrupt and broken Shia army can repeat that feat without extensive US help? The IAF is finding that Close Air Support is not as easy as it looks.

B.O. has left a big mess for the next US President to fix. What an a*shat.
Posted by: Squinty   2014-06-15 00:50  

00:00