Posted on 03/13/2015 10:20:26 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
IRBIL, IRAQ — Iraqi security forces and Iranian-backed Shiite Muslim militias appeared Thursday to be on the verge of victory in a two-week effort to recapture Saddam Hussein’s hometown from the Islamic State, which has held the symbolically important city since June.
But the seemingly certain triumph of a force with little Sunni Muslim participation in the center of Iraq’s Sunni heartland has raised another troubling issue: the extension of Iran’s influence in a country where the Shiite Muslim neighbor is already the most significant outside player.
The forces that appeared Thursday to have cornered the last Islamic State fighters in central Tikrit are dominated by Iranian military advisers. The Iraqi Shiite militias are all Iranian trained. And the offensive itself is being directed on the ground by Iran’s most influential general, Qassem Suleimani, who’s been a thorn in American efforts to pacify Iraq since the early days of the U.S. occupation of this country.
To add to American unease, there are credible reports that Iranian troops and fighters from Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement are participating in the Tikrit operation, and other reports that the Shiite militias and even U.S.-trained Iraqi troops have engaged in retaliatory attacks against Sunni residents. Those reports have convinced many Sunnis that the long-frayed relationship between Iraq’s Sunni and Shiite sects is now completely broken.
“It’s a Persian-led invasion of the Sunni triangle,” said one prominent leader of a Sunni tribe who has fled both the central government and the Islamic State for the safety of the Kurdish capital of Irbil. “We see Iranian troops and generals leading the fighting and the only Iraqi army units – which once represented all Iraqis – now only represent the Shiite parties and their Iranian leadership.”
(Excerpt) Read more at thestate.com ...
Isn’t this why Barry was in such a hurry to vacate Iraq?
Kinda the obvious conclusion once Saddam was removed as a buffer against Iran.
If Iran can clean up that mess, GOOD FOR THEM!
who are we against?...Iran and the shitites or ISIS?....its hard to figure who’s side we want to be on.
You are right on the money!!! Actually, the American people must be nuts or drugged enmasse!!! Obama, the America Hater, has engineered Iran into gaining the full control in Iraq!!! The outcome....a major war in the Middle East between Sunni & Shiite Muslims. Along the way these two fighting clans will slaughter every Christian, Jew & African Black Christian, they can get their hands on.
Then the USA will be next with the mass slaughter of American Jews, Christians and, especially African-Americans. And....yep the Obamabots will be in all their glory.......that is.....until the Muslims begin to slaughter all of them!!! LMAO!!! Americans......Dummies!!!
RE: who are we against?...Iran and the shitites or ISIS?....its hard to figure who’s side we want to be on.
On a scale of 1 to 10 in terms of extremism, ISIS is 10. I would put Iran at 8.
It was difficult during the Iran Iraq war during the 1980s too. This is just another round.
Not if we had stayed there. Perhaps we should not have gone in, but once in WE SHOULD NOT HAVE LEFT. I do believe Bush’s response against Iraq for Saddam invading Kuwait was a correct one.
I kind of agree with that. The bigger the pile of ISIS bodies the better. It’s hard to see so many Christians suffer and their historic artifacts destroyed. Thousands of years they remained intact, and then came Obama who opened the door for ISIS.
Kind of like Iraq and Iran war and want Hendry Kissinger said “neither are our friends and the best out come is for both to loose”
We are broke, and you want us spend more blood and treasure on Iraq. Never gonna happen.
Reagan was right to have Iraq as a buffer against Iran. That is over now. Invading Iraq was great for Iran.
Whoever prevails will still be our enemy.
Yet, even if ISIS is losing ground in Tikrit, that doesn't mean it's not a dangerous, destructive force elsewhere. Case in point is happening about 100 miles south of Tikrit in Ramadi, which the extremist group began assaulting on Wednesday. Faleh al-Issawi, deputy head of the Anbar provincial council, has said officials believe the Ramadi assault "is an ISIS response to the Tikrit operation." ... More than 40 Iraqi soldiers died when ISIS blew up the Iraqi army headquarters near Ramadi in Iraq's western Anbar province, an Anbar provincial leader told CNN on Friday. ISIS fighters there dug a tunnel underneath the army headquarters and detonated hundreds of homemade bombs, Sabah Al-Karhout, the head of the Anbar Provincial Council, said Thursday. The headquarters are located in the Albu Diab area, just 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) north of Ramadi. Al-Karhout denied reports that the U.S.-led coalition had bombed the headquarters. So, too, did the U.S. government, with its Baghdad embassy stating Friday that no coalition aircraft were even in the area...
Arbitrary lines drawn on a map by French and British diplomats divvying up the Ottoman Empire between themselves a hundred years ago were never going to last.
Baghdad Under Pressure to Stop Shia Militia ‘War Crimes’
By Jack Moore
3/13/15 at 1:26 PM
http://www.newsweek.com/baghdad-under-pressure-stop-shia-militia-war-crimes-313674?piano_t=1
Iraq’s militia leader calls Iranian support ‘unconditional’
by Qassim Abdul-Zahra
Associated Press
March 13, 2015
http://www.kentucky.com/2015/03/13/3744317/in-tikrit-fight-iraq-sunni-preacher.html
There is such a thing as the lesser evil. Iran and the Iraqi Shiites getting Iran’s support are a whole lot better from our point of view than ISIS and the Sunnis, who have been doing suicide bombing and assassination ever since Saddam was overthrown. Indeed, the terrorist Sunnis have been murdering Shiites in Iraq and all over the world, and I don’t blame the Shiites for fighting back.
tikrit nightlife
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qkbWgMxGa-I
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