Posted on 10/01/2014 11:57:56 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Iraqi Kurdish forces captured a strategic border crossing and several villages from Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) fighters in northern Iraq on Tuesday, scoring gains as the militants were pounded by heavy US-led airstrikes and the Iraqi Army advanced from the south.
An Iraqi Kurdish political source said Kurdish peshmerga fighters took control of the Rabia border crossing with Syria in a battle that began before dawn.
“It’s the most important strategic point for crossing. Once that’s taken it’s going to cut the supply route and make the operation to reach Sinjar easier,” the source said, referring to a mountain further south where members of the Yazidi minority sect have been trapped by the ISIS, now known as the Islamic State.
Twelve ISIS fighters’ bodies lay on the border at the crossing after the battle, said Hemin Hawrami head of the Kurdish Democratic Party’s foreign relations department, on Twitter.
The ability to cross the frontier freely has been a major tactical advantage for ISIS fighters on both sides. Fighters swept from Syria into northern Iraq in June and returned with heavy weapons seized from fleeing Iraqi government troops, which they have used to expand their territory in Syria.
US-led forces have been bombing ISIS targets in Iraq since August and expanded the campaign to Syria last week in an effort to defeat the fighters who have swept through Sunni areas of both countries, killing prisoners, chasing out Kurds and ordering Shias and non-Muslims to convert or die.
In two complex, multi-sided civil wars, the Sunni fighters are battling against Shia-backed government in both countries, rival Sunni groups in Syria and separate Kurdish forces on either side of the frontier.
Washington hopes the strikes, conducted with European allies in Iraq and with Arab air forces in Syria, will help government and Kurdish forces in Iraq and moderate Sunnis in Syria.
In Iraq, a coalition of Iraqi Army, Shia militia fighters and Kurdish troops known as peshmerga have been slowly recapturing Sunni villages that had been under ISIS control south of the Kurdish-held oil city of Kirkuk.
“At dawn today (Tuesday), two villages near Daquq, 40 kilometres south of Kirkuk, Peshmerga forces liberated them from ISIS,” an Iraqi security official said.
Islamic State fighters had used positions in the villages to fire mortars at neighbouring Daquq, a town populated mainly by ethnic Turkish Shias. When Kurdish fighters entered the villages they were empty, the security official said.
Forces were also pushing north from the city of Tuz Khurmatu to drive Islamic State fighters out of the countryside that surrounds Kirkuk, the official said. He credited US-led airstrikes with helping the peshmerga clear the two villages.
“This area witnessed intense airstrikes from US-led strikes and Iraqi airstrikes overnight and at dawn,” the official said.
Unlike in Iraq, where the US-led airstrikes are coordinated closely with the government and Kurdish forces, Washington has no powerful allies on the ground in Syria, making its strategy there riskier and more precarious.
The United States and its Western and Arab allies oppose the government of President Bashar al-Assad and are wary of helping him by hurting his enemies.
Turkey, the neighbour with the biggest military, has said it may get parliamentary apporval for joining the coalition force.
The ISIS fighters have laid siege to Kobani, a Kurdish city on Syria’s border with Turkey. The rattle of sporadic gunfire could be heard from across the frontier, and a shell could be seen exploding in olive groves on the western outskirts of town.
A steady stream of people, mostly men, were crossing the border post back into Syria, apparently to help defend the town. Ocalan Iso, deputy commander of the Kurdish forces defending the town, said Kurdish troops had battled ISIS fighters armed with tanks through the night and into Tuesday.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a body that monitors the war with a network on the ground, said US-led strikes had hit ISIS positions west of Kobani. Kurdish commanders have complained in recent days that the airstrikes hitting elsewhere were not helping them at the front.
Experts also believe that the ISIS is holding out in Syria after a week of being pounded by US-led airstrikes, benefiting from its tactical flexibility.
Meanwhile, US military efforts against the ISIS have cost nearly $1 billion so far and are likely to run between $2.4 billion and $3.8 billion per year if air and ground operations continue at the current pace, according to a think tank analysis.'
But a ramp-up, including more airstrikes and a significant boost in ground forces, could send costs soaring to between $13 billion and $22 billion annually, said the analysis.
Meanwhile ISIS closes in on Baghdad.
I’m not sure if Obama knows what he’s doing.
All I know is every airstrike has to go through his approval.
SEE HERE:
http://hotair.com/archives/2014/09/18/wsj-obama-will-personally-approve-u-s-strikes-in-syria/
TITLE: Obama will require military to get his personal approval for U.S. strikes in Syria
Cut their heads off and mount them on pikes.
Saw on Fox....hope Im wrong..Allies are waiting for Iraqi permission for strikes?????
It's Vietnam all over again.
Such approval is only for Syria. Who knows what 0bama requires when it comes to airstrikes along Iraq/Syria border. Oy Vey!
Didn’t Johnson personally pick the targets in North Vietnam? IIRC, he would target a place where empty trucks were parked but ignore the harbors and rail yards.
Too little, Too Late. Watch as the seige of Baghdad starts with a bombardment and use of Poison Gas by ISIS. Its not going to be pretty—in the end the streets will run with blood and severed heads. We should A) Put in more Troops or B) Pull out and leave the corrupt Iraqi Goverment to the tender mercy of the Calaph and his dogs.
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