Breaking point in bloody battle
Militiamen test mettle in retaking Mosul
The battle for Mosul has reached a critical stage that will test the mettle of U.S.backed Iraqi troops, with bloody house-to-house fighting, booby traps, suicide bombers, tunnels and human shields awaiting them in the city streets.
“It’s going to be some tough, house-to-house fighting — they’ll fight to the end,” said Marine Gen. Anthony Zinni, former chief of U.S. Central Command. “I’m sure there are prepared positions. I’m sure there are IEDs. That kind of warfare is really tough. That’s block by block, building by building.”
Yesterday, Iraqi special forces reached the eastern edge of the city and were within “hours” of moving in, an Iraqi commander told reporters.
Experts have said the U.S.trained Iraqi special forces can expect to encounter anything from improvised explosives, booby-trapped buildings and bridges, suicide bombers and an intricate system of tunnels dug by ISIS. Islamic State fighters have reportedly threatened to kill anyone in Mosul caught with a cellphone, a tactic meant to cut off the outside world from the city.
Iraqi troops in armored vehicles — many wielding American M-4 rifles and riding Humvees and Abrams tanks — took up positions less than a mile from Mosul’s eastern border and about 5 miles from the center, two weeks into the offensive to retake the city after ISIS captured it in 2014.
“We will enter the city of Mosul soon and liberate it from Daesh,” said Brig. Gen. Haider Fadhil of Iraq’s special forces, using an Arabic acronym for the extremists. He added that more than 20 militants had been killed while his forces suffered only one light injury from a fall.
Three suicide vehicle bombers tried to stop the advance before the army took control of Bazwaya, but the troops destroyed them, he said. The army said another unit, its 9th Division, had moved toward Mosul and was about 3 miles from its eastern outskirts, the neighborhood of Gogjali.
ISIS fighters used a Humvee packed with explosives that raced ahead and tried to ram the approaching forces, but Iraqi troops opened fire, blowing it up.
Witnesses in Mosul told CNN that several hundred ISIS fighters have arrived in the past few days from Raqqa in neighboring Syria. They say most of the new arrivals are foreign fighters who wear distinct uniforms. They have been wearing suicide belts for show, the reports said.
Others say that ISIS has booby-trapped dozens of empty houses in the Hadbaa neighborhood of northeastern Mosul. The U.S. military estimates ISIS has 3,000 to 5,000 fighters in Mosul and another 1,500 to 2,500 in its outer defensive belt.
While experts have said ISIS will not give up easily, the U.S.-led coalition plans to target Islamic State militants from the air if they attempt to flee toward Syria.
“This is all about getting after (the Islamic State) and setting up an opportunity where, should they try to escape, we have a builtin mechanism to kill them as they are departing,” Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Harrigian, commander of U.S. air forces in the Middle East, told USA Today.
Blocking militants from escaping has been a challenge as U.S.-backed forces have retaken towns and cities from ISIS.
Cedric Leighton, a retired Air Force colonel who held top posts at the National Security Agency and the Pentagon, said civilians in Mosul are at high risk.
“There will be a lot of loss of life. You could see several thousand people die in a situation like this, not just ISIS fighters, but civilians who happen to be caught in the cross fire,” he said.