The Road to Mosul: Reports From The Field
Thursday October 13, 2016
Two longtime veterans of American military operations in Iraq share their assessments of the campaign against the Islamic State as Iraqi forces prepare to liberate the city of Mosul.
On September 22, Brig. Gen. William F. Mullen III, USMC, and Daniel Green addressed a Policy Forum at The Washington Institute. Mullen, the commanding general of Marine Air Ground Task Force Training Command at Twenty-Nine Palms, California, has led U.S. forces on multiple fronts, including the Fallujah area of Iraq. Green is a defense fellow at the Institute and recently served in Iraq as a Sunni tribal analyst for the U.S. Navy. The following is a rapporteur’s summary of their remarks.
WILLIAM MULLEN
U.S. involvement in Iraq today faces constraints that were previously absent. The biggest difference now is the dramatically reduced U.S. footprint and control over operations. Coalition forces, especially the American component, often struggle with impatience because their preferred timeline for operations does not match that of the Iraqis. Moreover, the initial stagnancy of the Iraqi ground forces made it difficult to independently verify Iraqi intelligence regarding enemy targets, though the coalition was able to spot and strike them once Baghdad began conducting offensives into Islamic State-controlled areas.
The opponent has evolved as well. While the Islamic State’s predecessor, al-Qaeda in Iraq, faced constraints on its brutality due to the influence of al-Qaeda Central, IS today behaves in ways that are brutal beyond belief.
In the current situation, measuring progress depends on perspective. Despite Western impatience, political and military imperatives dictate that the upcoming offensive to retake Mosul be an indigenous Iraqi effort, which means that it will happen on an Iraqi timeline. From an Iraqi perspective, the campaign is progressing well, as forces are currently engaged in setting the stage for the Mosul offensive.
Looking to the future, the success of the current campaign will depend on the Iraqi government’s ability to capitalize on the coalition air campaign, regain sovereign control, and push IS underground. The hope is that as Iraqi forces push toward Mosul, IS will flee, as they did in Fallujah previously.
Still, brute force will not achieve coalition aims in the absence of political progress. The Iraqi government must attempt to reconcile with S...