Islamic State takes Ramadi government center; government troops fleeing

Islamic State forces launched a fierce assault of car bombs on Iraqi government security facilities overnight, and by late afternoon, their black flag was flying over the governor’s office. Security forces appeared to be in full flight as militants consolidated control over the area and prevented anyone from leaving the area.

“Daash is now in full control of the central government compound of Ramadi and battles are now raging in the last Ramadi areas held by government troops,” said a security official inside one of the last remaining pockets of government resistance, using the common Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. He asked not to be identified for security reasons and said he expected either to be forced to flee or be captured by the militants in the coming hours.

“Daash has surrounded the Anbar Operations Center and heavy fighting is taking place near the headquarters of operations,” said the official, who was inside the operations center. Gunfire and explosions could be heard over his phone line.

Local residents and security officials confirmed that not only was the Islamic State blocking residents from leaving the area, but had been going house to house gathering mobile phones of residents and had executed at least 50 pro-government tribal fighters as well as several top tribal leaders as they took control of the area.

Another police officer, who asked not be named because he expected to be captured shortly, said that residents who’d fled their homes “are begging anyone to save them after the Iraqi government abandoned them because of fears that the Daash will massacre their sons.”

Focus on Obama’s Terrible Iraq Blunder
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/2015/05/15/focus-on-obamas-terrible-iraq-blunder-ramadi/
Max Boot 05.15.2015

I remember walking down the ruined streets of Ramadi in the spring of 2007. The vista resembled pictures of Berlin in 1945: ruined buildings everywhere, water bubbling in the streets from water mains damaged by too many explosions. But what was most remarkable was not the evidence of violence but, rather, the fact that no insurgents were shooting at my military escorts or me.

“A few weeks ago you couldn’t drive down this street without being attacked. When I went down this street in February, I was hit three times with small-arms fire and IEDs,” Army Colonel John W. Charlton told me as we drove into town in his up-armored Humvee. But now Ramadi was eerily quiet; by the time I visited in April, not a single American soldier had been killed in Ramadi for weeks. Everywhere there were Joint Security Stations and Observation Posts where American and Iraqi security forces worked side by side to keep the peace.

Ramadi was really where the Anbar Awakening began—the movement, started by Colonel Sean MacFarland in Ramadi in 2006, to mobilize Sunni tribes against AQI. After having lost hundreds of American soldiers in Ramadi and its environs since 2003, US efforts finally appeared to have paid off. AQI had been routed of the capital of its self-proclaimed caliphate, and would soon be routed out of the rest of the Sunni Triangle. Victory was in sight.

(Snip)

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