US air power to bolster Iranian general’s bid to retake Tikrit
- HUGH TOMLINSON
- THE TIMES
- FEBRUARY 24, 2015 12:00AM
IRAN’S powerful spy chief is overseeing final preparations for an offensive — aided by US air support — to retake the Iraqi city of Tikrit from Islamic State as the counter-attack against the jihadists gathers pace.
Major-General Qassem Suleimani, commander of the Quds Force, the elite unit of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, is in Samarra, north of Baghdad, where thousands of troops and militia are gathering for the attack.
Iranian military sources said the offensive was set to begin within days, with Shia militias allied to the Iranians taking up positions to the south and east of the city. An artillery barrage on Islamic State positions in outlying villages is already under way.
The assault is expected to have air support from the US in the clearest example yet of the tacit military alliance between Washington and Tehran. Victory in Tikrit would be a huge morale boost to the US-led coalition before an attempt by the Iraqi military to reclaim its second city, Mosul, which is planned for April.
Tikrit is strategically crucial, as taking it would clear the road north to Mosul from Baghdad.
The home town of former dictator Saddam Hussein, Tikrit was one of the first cities captured by Islamic State in northern and central Iraq last northern summer.
Reclaiming the city will be a major test for the Iraqi forces, who were routed by the Islamists last year and are now rebuilding, with training from American troops and a new command structure headed by the Iranians.
The battle for Tikrit will be bloody. A previous attempt to retake the city ground to a halt as Iraqi troops found roads and buildings rigged with explosives.
Since then, Iran has taken control of the Iraqi army through its proxy militias.
Under General Suleimani’s command, Shia fighters were flung into a desperate defence of Baghdad and the Shia shrines at Karbala, Najaf and Samarra.
Six months on, they are commanding Iraqi troops, forcing the jihadists back from the Iraqi capital.
An Iranian government adviser said: “The military strategy has been reasonably successful so far. The buffer zone around Baghdad and the Iranian border is relatively secure. Expanding it will be much more difficult.”
The advance of Shia forces into a predominantly Sunni area will be provocative, however.
The Iranian-backed militias have been accused of a string of massacres in recent weeks in retaliation for atrocities by Islamic State.
When Tikrit fell last year, about 1700 Iraqi government troops were slaughtered by the Islamists and there are fears that soldiers will take their revenge on the civilian population if the city is retaken.
The Times
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We are about to see a major operation in Tikrit, hope they succeed in cleansing the city from filth of Daesh.
They should identify these pro-ISIS families/tribes and wipe them out completely.
<<< Al mawt
