Continuing Ops, Trouble in Mosul

While Operation Quick Strike continues, Coalition forces conduct Operations Able Warrior and Vanguard Thunder in and around Baghdad. The operations are being conducted simultaneously along the Euphrates river and are targeting specific terrorists cells.

In Mosul, a letter from Abu Zayd (the “emir of Farming reform battalion on the west side”) to Zarqawi is intercepted. The picture he paints of the leadership of the insurgency and conditions within the insurgency is not pretty.

[Abu Zayd] cited the incompetence of Mosul’s emirs and the disobedience of other people in the network. It discussed “the noticeable decrease in the attacks carried out by the mujahideen” and said that suicide bombings seem to be of more “quantity and not quality.”

The letter writer said that collaboration among insurgent leaders is lacking and that “Muslim money” was being squandered on “petty expenses, cars and phones.” He also wrote that “foreign fighters endure ‘deplorable’ conditions, including lack of pay, housing problems and marginalization.”

The letter offer solutions, including replacing the emirs, forming “new symbiotic battalions with diverse experience,” and “resolving the housing problem.”

“Be attentive to the jihad in Mosul and pursue its development, because the fall of Mosul in the hands of the mujahedeen is possible, and because it relieves the pressure off the other cities such as al-Qaim, Tal Afar.” [emphasis mine]

This squares with a letter written by Abu Asim al-Yemeni al-Qusaymi, a representative of Al-Qaida’s Committee in Iraq and member of its Shura council [a senior decision making body], which discussed the poor morale, leadership and conditions the fighters endure.

Abu Zayd is an asute jihad, and recognizes the importance of Mosul is occupying the Coalitions attention and diverting resources from the Coalition’s Euphrates River operations. Michael Yon has been reporting extensively on the operations in Mosul. The fighting is hard but US and Iraqi Army units in the Mosul region are making real progress in rooting out the insurgeny and restoring order.

This situation in Mosul has been reported to have been deteriorating since the capture of Abu Tahla and the subsequent dismantlement of his organization in Mosul. The persistent assualt on al Qaeda in Iraq’s middlement continues to take its toll on the organization, forcing greener leaders with fewer contacts to take command at a time when the Coalition is just beginning to bring its full might to bear in the Anbar province.

Bill Roggio is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and the Editor of FDD's Long War Journal.

8 Comments

  • Justin Capone says:

    The Kurds have said they were willing to totally clean out Mosul by sending the Peshmerga there, why don’t we let them say after the December election so we can focus our attention on Anbar.

  • TM Lutas says:

    The situation in Mosul is deteriorating? Deteriorating for whom?

  • peterargus says:

    “resolving the housing problem”
    Interesting. I doubt this housing problem is due to rising real estate prices or lack of rental properties. Maybe they can’t find “landlords” willing to risk the “special needs” a terrorist requires.

  • legion says:

    After three decades of abject misery and servitude, can the finally freed Iraqis decide to grow a backbone and tell their ill-bred arab cousins to go back to their home countries and get a life? Time to take a stand, Iraqis.
    The americans need some peace on the Iraqi front so they can attend to some other matters of state sponsored terrorism nearby. Cleaning out a cesspool is never pleasant or without cost.

  • Good News Out Of Iraq

    Plus add in the fact that many of his trusted aide’s are being captured or killed and it sure sounds as if things are going good. Not that MSM would tell you that.

  • leaddog2 says:

    Cesspool Syria coming up!

  • jeff says:

    hi bill or anybody with millitary experience/knowledge:
    the MSM keeps saying that we launch an “operation” into a city, we clear out the jihadists, then we leave because “we don’t have enough troops” and the jihadists poor back in.
    the MSM has been wrong pretty much the whole time, and i generally don’t trust them, but this time i don’t know what to say- they seem to have a point. please tell me that they’re wrong again, and why.

  • Patrick says:

    Jeff,
    Let me take a whack at this one,with the understanding Bill can correct me when he reads your question.
    1)Without intelligence,it does not make 1 bit of difference if we have 10 MILLION soldiers standing around Iraq. Our enemy does not dress in uniforms and challenmge us to a fight,so they would be USELESS,except as targets for jihadists IEDs.
    2)Until this late river war we appear to have instituted about 3 months ago,we didn’t,it seems to me,need more troops,as General Casey always says,we have never had any fear of being over run or executing any tactical offensive he commands based on intell.
    3)The more AMERICAN troopers and activity,the less Iraqi troopers and activity. They,according to my friends in Iraq,tend to look at us as “big brother” and we MUST force them and soon to grow on up and act without our guidance or assistance. This is not a knock on themthey have shown valor,plenty of it lately,but who would not look up to the US Army today in combat skills?
    #3 is SO critical,we probably lost South Vietnam because we took that war over from them and when we tired,they had flat not grown the culture of combat readiness to resist the NVA.
    Having said all of this,now that we have the river war with what appears to be a fairly good intell paradigm and it’s operational requirements of operating on both sides of the river in force,it is a fact that the field commanders in Anbar WISH they had at least 1 more American battalion on hand. They’ve said so and it exists because my son has the 26th MEU onboard his Kearsarge Strike Group which is either in Basra or close by.
    The fact that General Casey and/or General Abizaid have closed out that option tells me that #3 is over riding of all other considerations right now. They wish they could have more troopers there to press the terrorists(which I think we’re succeeding in doing quite well anyway)in the Anbar regions,but at the end of the day,it seems we are beginning to think of exit except for advisors and the IA must be shown the abyss of operating without us in strength above all considerations.
    Possibly they hold back the 26th MEU for other considerations,I am purely speculating.

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