Mosul

[abaris]

One does wonder if the Kurds will gladly hand over the ground they have fought for to a Shia dominated government in Baghdad?

They will sit it out. They have the resources to do it, sitting on a fair amount of oil.

[Minimalist]

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2016-0...604600.htm

Iraqi forces free 4 villages from IS in southern Mosul

MOSUL, Iraq, Aug. 16 (Xinhua) -- Iraqi security forces have freed four villages in the south of the Islamic State (IS) major stronghold of Mosul on Tuesday, a security source said.

[abaris]

Yeah, right now they're on the defensive everywhere. Which is good. Even more so since there's no hero or martyr story to be woven. It's been done by fellow muslim forces, which is the only approach making sense. Any western force would open all kinds of cans of wirms.

The fight against ISIL is also the only fight where the traditional army approach makes sense, since it is kind of a state to be deafeated and brought to it's knees.

[Minimalist]

I understand how the Kurds feel, but the Turks are going to lose their shit over this.

http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/mosul-...-553087723

Peshmerga push towards Mosul with eyes on a greater Kurdistan
[url=http://www.middleeasteye.net/topics/iraqatwar][/url]
Kurdish fighters have pressed further into IS-held territory in northern Iraq, and leaders are adamant any territory taken is theirs to keep

While the Kurds are often eager to say they fight the world’s enemy for the sake of humanity, they do not shy away from talking about their other goal: gaining ground for a greater Kurdistan.
By seizing territory from IS, the Peshmerga establish control over “disputed territories” - areas both claimed by the autonomous Kurd region of Iraq and the central government in Baghdad.
General Hama Rashid Rostam told Middle East Eye that ground seized by his men was rightfully Kurdish.
“We are fighting IS, but at the same time we have ambitions for Kurdistan: the Kurds as a nation and a people like everybody else,” he says in the freshly captured village of Qarqasha.

[abaris]

I understand how the Kurds feel, but the Turks are going to lose their shit over this.

Erdogans Turkey is the real enemy here. According to a leaked report of the German government, a major sponsor of islamist terrorist organisations. I hope this report has consequences. It's all over the German and Austrian news right now, but I didn't have the time to look up an international link.

[Thumpalumpacus]

The fight against ISIL is also the only fight where the traditional army approach makes sense, since it is kind of a state to be deafeated and brought to it's knees.

They made the mistake of bringing their insurgency into the sunlight, giving conventional forces a nail-head to hammer.

[Minimalist]

They got too big for their britches!

[Minimalist]

http://www.thenational.ae/world/middle-e...-isil-iraq

Battle for Mosul exposes fractures that threaten to haunt post-ISIL Iraq

But the months leading up to the final push for Iraq’s second largest city have laid bare some of the fractures that will haunt post-ISIL Iraq. From the growing influence of the Iranian-backed Shiite militias sanctioned by the government to the simmering tensions between Baghdad and authorities in the autonomous Kurdish region.

Taking the city will be only part of the battle.

[Fidel_Castronaut]

I support the Kurds 100%. Probably the only group left in the ME worth supporting (or who haven't been entirely genocided).

[Fidel_Castronaut]

I understand how the Kurds feel, but the Turks are going to lose their shit over this.

Erdogans Turkey is the real enemy here. According to a leaked report of the German government, a major sponsor of islamist terrorist organisations. I hope this report has consequences. It's all over the German and Austrian news right now, but I didn't have the time to look up an international link.

QFT.

Erdogan is basically just an Islamist dictator at this point, constrained by the last vestiges of Turkey's ailing and disappearing democracy. It's pretty much a given that he's been quietly supporting extremist elements within Turkey's sphere of influence for years now, and it's probably why the US and other NATO allies were secretly hoping for the coup to oust him.

A failed state in the next 10 years cast out by the west. Erdogan hates Putin too, so maybe Turkey will become the next Iran? I feel desperately sorry for the secularists, some of whom I know.