Category Iraq

Islamic State Loses Border Area with Turkey

Nice summary of the situation: IS loss of border area with Turkey sharply harms group

A few highlights:

  1. ISIL has been expelled from the last area it controlled on the Turkish border. This effectively cuts it supply lines to the outside world.
  2. People fighting ISIL include:
    1. United States
    2. Turkey
    3. Iran
    4. Russia
    5. Iraqi government troops
    6. Popular Mobilization Forces (Iraqi Shiite militia)
    7. Syrian government troops
    8. Hezbollah (from Lebanon)
    9. Kurdish-led Syria Democratic Forces
    10. Kurdish Peshmerga fighters in Iraq
    11. Sunni tribesmen (Iraq)
    12. Sultan Murad (Syria)
    13. Mountain Hawks (Syria)
    14. Shamiya Front (Syria)
    15. Liberation Army (Syria)
    16. And probably a few others.
  3. In Syria, ISIL killed 4,401 people since June 2014, including 2,369 civilians
  4. In Iraq, ISIL has killed thousands.
  5. Archeological sites damaged/destroyed
    1. Temple of Bel, Palmyra
    2. Temple of Baalshamin, Palymyra
    3. Nimrod in Iraq
    4. Hatra in Iraq
    5. and probably a few others.

Some back-of-the-envelope calculations

Keying off Shawn’s previous post…if the DOD figures are accurate this means:

  1. In about two years, we have killed 45,000 insurgents from a force of around 25,000.
    1. This is around 100% losses a year
    2. This means the insurgents had to completely recruit an entire new force every year for the last two years
      1. Or maybe we just shot everyone twice.
    3. It is clear the claimed kills are way too high, or the claimed strength is too low, or a little bit of both
  2. We are getting three kills per sortie.
    1. Now, I have not done an analysis of kills per sorties in other insurgencies (and this would be useful to do), but I am pretty certain that this is unusually high.
  3. We are killing almost a 1,000 insurgents (not in uniform) for every civilian we are killing.
    1. Even if I use the Airwars figure of 1,568 civilians killed, this is 29 insurgents for every civilian killed.
    2. Again, I have not an analysis of insurgents killed per civilian killed in air operations (and this would be useful to do), but these rates seem unusually low.

It appears that there are some bad estimates being made here. Nothing wrong with doing an estimate, but something is very wrong if you are doing estimates that are significantly off. Some of these appear to be off.

This is, of course, a problem we encountered with Iraq and Afghanistan and is discussed to some extent in my book America’s Modern Wars. It was also a problem with the Soviet Army in World War II, and is something I discuss in some depth in my Kursk book.

It would be useful to develop a set of benchmarks from past wars looking at insurgents killed per sorties, insurgents killed per civilian killed in air operations (an other types of operations), insurgents killed compared to force strength, and so forth.

We Have 4,000+ Troops in Iraq Now

Another Iraq article: Airstrikes

A couple of things that caught my attention:

  1. 9,400 coalition airstrikes (in Iraq and Syria?) since August 8, 2014
    1. 55 civilians killed by airstrikes in Iraq and Syria, or 1,568 depending on who you wish to believe.
  2. 3,800 U.S forces currently in Iraq
    1. not including hundreds who are on temporary duty
    2. not including 560 additional troops approved last month?
    3. Are we going to be over 5,000?

Does anyone know what the current Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) is?

5,000

IS Weakening Inside Mosul

Key quote: “We still anticipate that somewhere between 5,000 or so fighters are inside Mosul,” Garver said. “We’re still anticipating a tough fight.”

There are also ISIL fighters outside of Mosul. Note that the article states that Mosul is the home of 2 million. This is probably not the case after two years of Islamic State rule. I have seen estimates as low as 500,000.

Islamic State Strength Estimates

We have no way of confirming the accuracy of these estimates (unlike our work during the Iraq and Afghan insurgencies), but a somewhat negative article on the Iraqi Army published in the New York Times in June does provide strength estimates for the Islamic State. The article is: New York Times Article

A few details:

  1. “The Islamic State has roughly 19,000 to 25,000 fighters, about half in Iraq and half in Syria…”
  2. “Most of the 10,000 to 12,000 in Iraq are concentrated around Mosul, in the Tal Afar area, and elsewhere in Nineveh Province.”

More on the Mosul Offensive

The article here is a nice summary of the situation. Mark Perry is an old friend of The Dupuy Institute. It does have a political slant in its introduction, but the rest of it is good analysis. We usually try to avoid politics in this blog.

Mark Perry on Mosul

A few highlights:

  1. Offensive is now tentatively schedule to begin sometime in early October.
  2. …with a final battle for Mosul coming at the end of October (and therefore the political slant to the article).
  3. The attack might be coordinated with an attack on Raqqa in Syria, the capital of the shrinking Islamic State.
  4. U.S. advisors are with Iraqi units at the battalion-level.
  5. Over 200 U.S. advisors are at al-Qayyarah air base, 40 miles south of Mosul.
  6. There is an effort to include local Sunni’s in the effort, along with a CENTCOM estimate that Anbar’s Sunnis can contribute at most 10,000 soldiers to the Mosul effort.

Islamic State Fighter Estimates for Mosul

An article just quoted an estimate for the number of Islamic State fighters in and around Mosul: Retaking Mosul

They estimate that “IS fighters in Mosul, meanwhile, vary from a few thousand to “not more than 10,000.” according to the coalition.”

They also note that the current population of Mosul is estimated at between 500,000 and one million. Also: “Al-Hashimi, the analyst, estimated retaking Mosul would require 80,000 men, of whom 15,000 are expected to come from the government-sanctioned Shiite militias.’

Also note: “An official…said there was not yet a detailed plan for retaking Mosul. “for now, the plan is simply that Mosul is next.'”

Anyhow, estimating the size of an insurgency or irregular force is somewhat of a challenge. Part of the challenge is that a significant percent (the majority?) of the force and the support personnel for the force is not “full-time”….so to say. They are people that are activated irregularly and as needed. I ended up with an entire chapter in my book America’s Modern Wars on estimating insurgent force size. In the end, I concluded that you are probably best estimating the force size based upon their levels of activity (incidents occurred and people killed) compared to other insurgencies. This did produce estimates higher than the official U.S. DOD estimates for Iraq and Afghanistan. In retrospect, it appear our estimates were closer to reality.

Of course, all these “part-time” and “casual” insurgents disappear back into the population when you occupy an area and are available to be called upon again.

Population around Mosul

Mosul is a big prize. The Islamic State is fundamentally different without this city. A few population stats pulled from this article: Up to One Million Could Flee Mosul

1. “An estimated 3 million people live under Islamic State rule in Iraq” (plus they control significant territory and population in Syria).

2. Mosul has 1.2-1.4 million

3. Another 825,000 live in the Nineveh plain and provinces of Kirkuk and Salhuddin

4. 250,000 are in Anbar province

The Nineveh plains are to the north and east of Mosul. Kirkuk and Salhuddin provinces are to the south and southeast of Mosul. So if there is a successful campaign to take Mosul (and we have kind of been waiting for one since June 2014), then we are looking at one or two million people possibly stripped from the Islamic State.

 

ISIL Oil Revenues

I gather it has kind of been a grind to get to this point, but this article notes that: ISIS Suffers Near Collapse in Oil Revenue

A few interesting quotes:

  1. “The Islamic State, pushed off more than half the Iraqi territory it seized in 2014…”
  2. “….with partial access to just two of the five Iraqi oil fields it once controlled.”
  3. “In May the US estimated that its revenue had been roughly halved to $250 million a year from the territory it controlled in Iraq and Syria”
  4. “The loss of oil revenues has forced the militants to cut salaries by a third….”
  5. “They have also imposed more taxes on farmers, truckers, and traders and increased fines for minor violations of religious bans….”
  6. “At least 100 drivers were killed trying to smuggle crude into Syria. Drivers are refusing to go…..”
  7. “I saw my brother get killed by an airstrike while sitting inside his truck. Other trucks were blown up like in a video game.”

 

Mosul to be Retaken Soon?

It looks like Mosul is about to be retaken soon:

Mosul Assault in Focus….

It is about time. Don’t recall many cases where the insurgents grabbed a major city and it took the conventional forces over two years to retake it. Jaffna by the Tamil Tigers and maybe a few other cases.

A few highlights:

  1. Might happen in October
  2. “…campaign needs 20,000-30,000 troops.”
  3.  “A few thousand police and 15,000 local fighters….to hold land after the assault.”
  4. “Mosul still houses one million civilians…”
  5. “…up to 10,000 jihadists are in the city…”