IS Diary - 7 August 2014

"Pat - My folks were loading magazines last I checked.  Just texted them.  Firefight was on outskirts of city. Irbil will probably hold, but they'll probe Duhok too.  Their MO is lightning penetration of Pesh lines, which has been successful.  They attack every few miles, break the lines, then pince together and mop up.  Hopeful enough heavy equipment has dropped in so that won't be the case.  Also, they've learned to spread their forces to be less vulnerable to air.  Lots of drones would be helpful here."  Old Soldier (OS)

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I received the above from a friend who is trying to save a few of the Yazidis trapped on the mountain at Sinjar.  He is a retired infantry officer with a lot of combat experience.  He was a battalon adviser with the ARVN airborne division in 1971- 72.  He has men in the field trying to affect a rescue.

ISIS will surely kill any Yazidis who fall into their hands.  For ISIS the Shia are murtadd (apostates) and deserving of death, but the Yazidi are not Muslim at all.  For ISIS they are watheni (pagans).  Logically, pagans should be given the chance to accept ISIS's version of Islam, but that does not seem to be their policy.

His field man's description of IS coalition tactics against the Pesh Merga are what I would expect.  The Old Iraqi Army military experts who are the fighting brain of the IS coalition were well schooled in the military art.  I remember conversations with men like these concerning tactical and operational level methods in the world wars.  This has Guderian, Patton, Manstein et al written all over it.  In addition to that theoretical base, the Old Iraqi Army had a lot of largely successful experience fighting the Kurds.  That helps.

And in another bit of terrible news it seems that the Mosul Dam has been captured by IS.  To the west of Baghdad they also control the Haditha Dam and the Al-Qaim Dam as well.  These are major hydroelectric resources.  What will happen if the lights go out in Baghdad?

Will Irbil fall?  Who can say? 

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-08-07/iraqi-islamists-overrun-christian-towns-in-push-for-major-dams.html

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/08/07/us-iraq-security-idUSKBN0G70LO20140807

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/07/40000-iraqis-stranded-mountain-isis-death-threat

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yazidi

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"IS is now on Turkey’s radar not because of its massacres in Iraq or hostage Turks, but because of the activities of people affiliated with the group inside Turkey.

On Juy 29, the first day of the Eid al-Fitr holiday marking the end of Ramadan, the sight of mass outdoor prayers performed by a large crowd of long-bearded men in white robes and the sermon that followed ignited a serious debate in Turkey. The sermon included, among other things, “Those who believe, those who … participate in jihad on the path of Allah with their lives and all their beings will be rewarded generously. They are the ones who will survive. Our plea to Allah Almighty is to accept us jihadists. We beg him to compassionately help the mujahideen, those in jihad … to hit their targets accurately.” 

Images of this assembly were provided by the group itself. Only after they were released on websites known to be closely affiliated with IS did the mainstream media become aware of them and run the images.

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This brings to mind the line of poetry quoted today by Babak.  The line ran roughly that a man who raises a wolf is eventually torn to pieces by it.  Did Erdogan really think that his half baked Islamism would protect him from the IS forces that he has nurtured and given training space and sanctuary?  pl

Read more: http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/08/cengiz-isis-mosul-iraq-syria-consul-general-kidnappings-akp.html##ixzz39inphDup

 

Comments

[John]

For those not familiar with the major battle at An Loc, Vietnam in 1972: http://anloc.org/

[Tyler]

You can't be serious.

The USG, thanks to the neocons, has had what seems like an intentional plan to drive the last of the Christian communities out of the ME by attempting to wreck the governments of anyone who would keep them safe.

We could use a Crusade, but the Pope is too busy telling the US how we need more illegal aliens from Central America.

[Tyler]

As the good Colonel said, stop destabilizing anyone who isn't on board with whatever insanity that the USG and the Children's Crusade (great term BTW) come up with that week.

The solution is going to come from Syria, Jordan, and the rest of the countries in that area, but we could stop trying to arm their enemies and destabilize them for shits and gigs.

The US and the West are proving themselves unreliable and unstable as a whole. Chalk it up to the cultural winter we find ourselves in and the madness of our societies.

[Tyler]

Its an absolute cluster, agreed. I saw my old BC posting on the facebooks about how "we did great work over there" and on and on. Sorry, I don't remember "great work", I remember trying to not to go nuts from a mission that seemed to change from week to week.

Schadenfreude was watching his marriage disintegrate on social media.

[Cee]

Pat,

What you said reminds of what Kissinger said about protecting the Kurds...foreign policy should not be confused with missionary work.
No offense.

[turcopolier]

Cee

"foreign policy should not be confused with missionary work. No offense." I don't know what you are talking about. I did not advocate protecting the Kurds. The KRG is merely necessary and useful. On the other hand if you mean trying to save the Yazidis perched on their wretched mountain, I would do that. Some things should be done because there is a moral and ethical imperative to do them. This is like Churchill intervening on the side of Greece against the Germans in 1941. It was obviously going to be a losing proposition but as he said it had to be done. pl

[Ishmael Zechariah]

Colonel Lang,

Thank you for this statement. I would fight for the Yazidis. If they are taken and killed, without anyone lifting a finger, it will be a sad, sad day for humanity.

Ishmael Zechariah

[Tyler]

The West must rediscover its Crusader spirit if it is going to win, in the long run. The moral relativism and stupid electronic toys that make up so much of our society's idiotic core are no match for clarity of though, no matter how wrong.

[Fred]

Tyler,

The Crusader spirit it not something taught by academics in our universities.

[alba etie]

Tyler
I find myself agreeing more and more with your views . This is disquieting to me at sixty one years young & a self identified FDR democrat .

[alba etie]

Tyler
Please define Crusader Spirit ?

[Cee]

Col. Pat,

My response was in reponse to what you said above

Our major concern is not about native Christians or Yazidis, Druze, Alawis or whatever. IS threatens the existing state structure in the region in its desire t create a theocratic universalist state of its own design

I fully support what Obama is doing now because it is the moral thing to do and we could gain new allies by wiping out those lunatics that I have read were trained and funded by the Israelis and the Saudis. No friends of ours.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Is the European Union or the United State willing to pay Turkey to wage this war?

[turcopolier]

Babak

We do not pay people to wage war. Neither are we paid no matter what kind of BS some people want to believe. pl

[Tyler]

To know right from wrong without engaging in Talmudic style arguing of black into white.

Moral purity of thought, in other words. No relativism, cultural or otherwise that pervades our culture.

[Tyler]

I'm sure someone has a pithy quote, but all I can say is that I agree. Mine are not the views of someone living during a stable period, but someone who sees the coming storm.