CENTRAL COMMAND: CENTCOM & THE LONG WAR - CounterStrikeMedia

Mosul: One Week In & Aleppo After the Russian Bombing

10/31/2016

The city of Tal Afar, a former Ottoman outpost not far from Mosul that has a mostly ethnic Turkmen population and has been home to a corps of Islamic State leaders, on Saturday became the focus of a growing struggle between Turkey and Iran for influence in northern Iraq. – New York Times

Retired Army Gen. David H. Petraeus has no doubt that the forces bearing down on Mosul will drive out the Islamic State extremists who for two years have controlled what was once Iraq’s second-largest city. The question, he says, is what happens next. – Los Angeles Times

A new order in Mosul and the surrounding region already has begun to take shape, before troops even have entered the city. With competing visions, powerful players including Turkey, Iran, the Kurds and the U.S.-backed Iraqi government are jostling for influence. The battle will forge its own reality, with the violence possibly sending hundreds of thousands of people searching for shelter away from their homes. – Washington Post

Tyler Stapelton writes: Congress and the next administration should start discussions as soon as possible on the U.S. role in Iraq after ISIS is driven out, including the possibility of maintaining a long-term security presence to continue supporting and strengthening the legitimate institutions of the Iraqi state. – Foundation for Defense of Democracies

The buses, once a benign, even beloved feature of the urban landscape, have become a signature of the Syrian government’s starve-or-surrender strategy. In recent days, government warplanes dropped fliers on the rebel-held districts of Aleppo, offering a stark choice to the estimated 250,000 people trapped in that strategic city: “doom,” represented by a photo of a bloody body, or “redemption,” in the form of a green bus. – New York Times

More than two months after the United Nations concluded that Syria attacked its citizens with chemical weapons, President Barack Obama’s administration has yet to mount a concerted effort at the U.N. Security Council to impose biting sanctions on Damascus. The U.S. reluctance has put Washington at odds with its closest allies, Britain and France, which want to put Moscow on the spot for its support of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. – Foreign Policy

Washington Post: Iraqi Forces Enter Center Mosul

Afghan Defense Collapsing

10/31/2016

Taliban gain ground as Afghan soldiers surrender their posts

WaPo editorial: The next president and the Middle East

Besieged Afghan officials in the southern province of Oruzgan said on Sunday that scores of regular Afghan soldiers had surrendered in the past week to the Taliban, a trend also occurring recently in other provinces. – New York Times

Thirteen years ago the United States called the reconstruction of the Kabul-Kandahar highway "the most visible sign" of efforts to rebuild Afghanistan. But today, that stretch of road is no longer a sign of progress. Instead, littered with bomb craters and insurgent checkpoints, it's now "beyond repair," according to an Afghan official, and a symbol of the failed U.S. intervention here. – Washington Post

Opium production is up 43 percent in Afghanistan, the economy is struggling and the government has lost ground to insurgents over the last year, according to an inspector general’s report released Sunday that shows ongoing failures overshadowing the few signs of hope. – Washington Times

Women remain embattled in Afghanistan some 15 years after the U.S. intervention there, according to a U.S. watchdog’s report released Sunday that says they have made strides in education and economic opportunity, but attitudes within the country are increasingly hostile. – Washington Times

The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction quarterly report found that many of the improvements made when there were more American and coalition troops in the country are also slipping away. – Washington Examiner

The Afghan government lost control or influence between May and August over two percent of the territory it controlled, the U.S. government's top watchdog on Afghanistan said in a report on Sunday, a sign of the precarious security situation in the country and challenges posed by the Taliban and other militant groups. - Reuters

The Taliban’s internal debate over whether and how to negotiate with the Afghan government is playing out in the open, even as there have been renewed attempts to restart talks. – New York Times

As Afghanistan tries to institute reforms in its security sector, it has struggled to bring order to the dizzying array of militias, irregular fighters, personal bodyguards and other armed groups that often fight the Taliban but also battle among themselves. – Los Angeles Times

The Afghan government lost control of 2 percent of its territory this summer, as Taliban insurgents have continued to launch attacks in an ongoing conflict that top officials describe as a “stalemate.” – Washington Free Beacon

The casualty rate has soared again this year for the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces, which have also been hit by a wave of Afghan-on-Afghan "insider attacks," according to an inspector general's quarterly report to Congress. – Military.com

Iraqi Shia Clerics from the South Gain Advantage

10/31/2016

Defense One

How The Brotherhood Lost Egypt

10/30/2016

In the tumultuous two years since President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi of Egypt came to power, one ally has kept the Arab world’s most populous country from economic ruin: Saudi Arabia pumped more than $25 billion into the faltering Egyptian economy, dwarfing aid from the United States. The Saudis may have thought they were buying loyalty. But Egypt’s vote last month for a Russian United Nations resolution on Syria threatens to unravel Mr. Sisi’s relationship with Egypt’s most crucial benefactor. – New York Times

Report: In a new POMED Report, Rethinking U.S. Economic Aid to Egypt, POMED Deputy Director for Research Amy Hawthorne takes a detailed look at U.S. bilateral economic aid for Egypt….The aid relationship often has been contentious and the program has long needed an overhaul, but it especially has struggled for purpose and direction since 2011, in the face of growing Egyptian government restrictions. – Project on Middle East Democracy

National Geographic's Pashtun Icon Arrested

10/29/2016

An Afghan woman whose photograph as a young refugee with piercing green eyes was published on the cover of National Geographic in 1985, becoming a symbol of the turmoil of war in Afghanistan, was arrested on Wednesday in Pakistan on charges of fraudulently obtaining national identity cards. – New York Times

The Afghan woman who was the subject of an iconic magazine cover will be deported from Pakistan, where she has lived as a refugee for more than three decades, a judge ruled Friday. – Los Angeles Times

Failure of Oslo & Two State Solution

10/26/2016

City Journal, Manhattan Institute

Seige of Aleppo, Arab Civilization & Revolutionary Ethos of Mao in Mosul

10/26/2016

Salam Muhammad Ujaym al-Hababi, was targeted Sunday in an airstrike in Kunar’s remote Helgal valley, the Pentagon announced Wednesday. Little-known outside counterterrorism circles, he was indeed a big deal: Though only in his mid-30s, Farouq was believed to be the senior al-Qaeda operative remaining in Afghanistan at a time when many of the group’s bigwigs have decamped for Syria, and U.S. government documents suggest he may have been involved in plotting attacks abroad. – Washington Post’s Checkpoint

Foreign Policy Initiative: Aleppo, Russia & U.S. Resources

Satellite imagery of the current operations by Iraqi forces to retake Mosul reveal how the Islamic State can inflict damage even when the militant group is on the run. – Washington Post

Just 10 days into the long-awaited offensive to retake Mosul from the Islamic State, the campaign has unleashed a fresh set of horrors across a wide stretch of the country. Although the government’s military operation itself is largely meeting its goals in progressing toward the city, the turmoil surrounding it is a sign of just how difficult it would be to secure a lasting peace across Iraq’s many divisions even after a victory. – New York Times

More than a thousand Sunni Arabs displaced from battlefields across Iraq have fled the northern city of Kirkuk in recent days, after they were threatened with expulsion by Kurdish authorities in the city, relief workers said Tuesday. – Washington Post

Free of the militant group’s stern Islamic strictures, men cut their beards, women removed their veils. Families prepared for reunions with family they had not seen in years. But freedom brought new problems. The villagers found themselves treated with suspicion, held under guard, searched and questioned even before arriving at the residential camps for Iraqis displaced by the war — were they innocent civilians, or militants in disguise? – Los Angeles Times

David Ignatius writes: When the United States fights its wars in the Middle East, it has a nasty habit of recruiting local forces as proxies and then jettisoning them when the going gets tough or regional politics intervene…And now, I fear, this syndrome is happening again in Syria, as a Kurdish militia group known as the YPG, which has been the United States’ best ally against the Islamic State, gets pounded by the Turkish military. – Washington Post

William McCants and Craig Whiteside write: The Islamic State’s understanding of the ebb and flow of revolutionary warfare, and even the terminology it uses to explain its rejuvenating withdrawal, is indebted to Mao. It is not an insurgency based in cities but rather an insurgency that grows strong in the wilderness and then overwhelms cities. When it relinquishes its hold on cities in Iraq and Syria in the coming months, who will pursue the group into its desert hideouts and river valley swamps? - Lawfare

Cole Bunzel writes: The Islamic State’s mouthpieces preach that this is a period of “trial” (ibtila). It is not that God has ceased to favor the Islamic State, for that is of course inconceivable. Rather, divine favor comes with ups and downs. It is God’s practice to subject His creation to trials and tests, as He subjected the prophets and the early Muslims before our time – Foreign Policy

Mosul: Coalition Forces In Center of City & North Africa

10/25/2016

Iraq

One week into the battle for Mosul, U.S. troops are embedded with Iraqi battalion- and brigade-level units, pushing forward with mobile headquarters elements as the fight moves toward the dense city center, according to U.S. officials familiar with the operation. – Military Times

Dozens of terrorists who struck Iraq’s oil capital of Kirkuk on Friday are still roaming the city, while Turkmen Shia residents are reeling from an unexplained bombing of a mosque south of the city. – Washington Free Beacon

Iraqi forces, backed by hundreds of U.S. military forces, have taken 800 square kilometers back from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in the first week of the Mosul offensive, U.S. officials said Monday. – The Hill

The fall of Mosul will set in motion yet another training cycle for the Iraqi Security Forces and a return to the counter-insurgency strategy that will keep U.S. troops in Iraq indefinitely, according to U.S. military officials. – Military.com

Islamic State expanded its attacks on Monday against the army and Kurdish forces across Iraq, trying to relieve pressure on the militant group's defenses around Mosul, its last major urban stronghold in the country. - Reuters

The scale of the operation - the largest of several by Islamic State to divert an advance on their stronghold in Mosul - shows how tough the battle for Mosul may become and points to a continued ability of the militant group to undermine security across the country even if its northern bastion falls. - Reuters

Over the last two years, the extremists have adopted innovative tactics and launched diversionary attacks along the amoeba-like frontiers of their self-styled caliphate, and many now fear they have more surprises in store as Iraqi forces close in on Mosul, the militants' last urban bastion in the country. – Associated Press

Hundreds of displaced Sunni Arab families have had to leave Kirkuk after an Islamic State attack on the Kurdish-controlled city which authorities suspect was helped by Sunni sleeper cells, humanitarian workers and residents said on Tuesday. - Reuters

Editorial: Defeating Islamic State in Mosul is a vital U.S. interest, but the only way the next Administration will be able to prevent an Islamic State resurgence or Iranian domination of the region is a long-term U.S. deployment in Iraq of several thousand troops, both for political leverage with Iraq and other regional players and as a regional rapid-reaction force. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Mosul & Syria: The next Moves

10/24/2016

US, Iraqi troops push toward Mosul’s center

Plans to send heavier weapons to CIA-backed Syrian rebels stall
Rogin: Will Clinton fulfill her promise to increase US involvement in Syria?
General Allen + Lister, Fred Hof, Max Boot on next steps in Syria
Pentagon expects Mosul push to unlock trove of intel on ISIS
NYT and WSJ reports on the Mideast that awaits the new President
WaPo editorial and Hassan on the fight against ISIS after Mosul
US Special Ops accelerate killings of ISIS leaders

With the fight for Mosul entering its second week, the Obama administration is under pressure to declare victory over the Islamic State, a win the White House says would validate the president’s strategy of waging proxy wars against the terrorist group in Iraq and Syria days before Americans head to the polls. – Washington Times

Kurdish forces claimed new advances against Islamic State in the battle for Mosul on Sunday, but the extremist fighters hit back with a third straight day of attacks in the northern city of Kirkuk and a new strike in western Anbar province. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

A fire set by Islamic State militants at a sulfur mine near the city of Mosul in recent days sent plumes of noxious gases over the battlefield, sickening hundreds of civilians and forcing Iraqi and U.S. troops to wear protective masks, health and military officials said on Saturday. – Washington Post

Iraqi Shiite militias said Friday they were set to join the battle to dislodge Islamic State from the northern city of Mosul, adding a potent but controversial fighting force to the effort. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Thousands of people who lived for the past two years under the rule of the militants have begun to escape their villages as a huge Iraqi force closes in on the northern city of Mosul, free now to tell their stories of brutality and privation and near-death escapes. Most, though, are Sunni Muslims, unable to celebrate just yet as they face questions from the authorities and the country at large about their years living alongside the Sunni militants, as well as any ties to the jihadists, whether real or just perceived. – Washington Post

A dispute between Iraq and Turkey has emerged as a dramatic geopolitical sideshow to the complicated military campaign to retake Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city, from the Islamic State. – New York Times

Iraq’s prime minister on Saturday rejected the possibility of Turkish involvement in the current campaign to liberate Mosul from the Islamic State, just a day after Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter announced that he had reached an “agreement in principle” with Turkish officials that would allow Turkey to participate in the battle. – Washington Post’s Checkpoint

The battle for Mosul has seen snipers, car bombs, missiles, oil-filled moats waiting for the torch, secret village-to-village tunnels, and a burning sulfur plant — and yet U.S. war leaders here warn that this is the light stuff. With each advance of Iraqi, Kurdish, and American forces, ISIS resistance is hardening. – Defense One

ISIS rounded up and killed 284 men and boys as Iraqi-led coalition forces closed in on Mosul, the terror group's last major stronghold in Iraq, an Iraqi intelligence source told CNN. - CNN

[A]s U.S. and Iraq forces get underway with the battle for Mosul, the real threat of the extremist group effectively deploying chemical weapons is extremely limited, according to numerous top military officials. – Military Times

For the first time in two years, Hussam Matteh prayed in his ancestral Christian homeland after Iraqi security forces recaptured Bartella this week — the first Iraqi Christian town to be wrested from the grip of jihadi militants. – Financial Times

U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter visited Irbil on Sunday for a closer assessment of the fight against the Islamic State group in northern Iraq and to hear from Kurdish leaders whose forces launched a new offensive in the operation to wrest Mosul from the militants' control. – Associated Press

Kurdish fighters said they had taken the town of Bashiqa near Mosul from Islamic State on Sunday as coalition forces pressed their offensive against the jihadists' last stronghold in Iraq. - Reuters

If local fighters in Mosul can be persuaded to drop their allegiance to Islamic State, there is a chance that the battle can be brought to a more speedy conclusion, and that could have major implications for the future of Iraq. - Reuters

Editorial: Ultimately, victory over terrorist forces in Iraq will require a sustained American presence, both military and civilian, extending well beyond the liberation of Mosul. The president should be laying the groundwork for that now, with Mr. Abadi and with U.S. allies, so that his successor can avoid Mr. Obama’s signal mistake in Iraq: a premature and self-defeating withdrawal. – Washington Post

Hassan Hassan writes: The war against the Islamic State is unwinnable without filling the political and security vacuum that now exists in too much of Iraq. The Islamic State’s eventual retreat from Mosul will be a much-needed victory for the country. But unless the government in Baghdad enables Iraqi Sunnis to fill that void, it will once again emerge from the desert. – New York Times

Syria

As rebel-held sections of Aleppo crumbled under Russian bombing this month, the Obama administration was secretly weighing plans to rush more firepower to CIA-backed units in Syria….Neither approved nor rejected, the plan was left in a state of ambiguity that U.S. officials said reflects growing administration skepticism about escalating a covert CIA program that has trained and armed thousands of Syrian fighters over the past three years. – Washington Post

A burst of fighting in the flash-point Syrian city of Aleppo on Sunday appeared to shatter a unilateral Russian cease-fire, signaling a resumption of the government’s offensive to seize rebel-held areas there. – Washington Post

The top United Nations human rights official on Friday called the weekslong bombardment and siege of rebel-held parts of Aleppo “crimes of historic proportions” that had turned the ancient Syrian city into a “slaughterhouse.” – New York Times

The Admiral Kuznetsov, Russia’s lone, rather geriatric aircraft carrier, steamed through the English Channel toward the Mediterranean Sea on Friday in the Kremlin’s latest attempt to reassert its lost superpower status. – New York Times

Amid the diplomatic storm over the Syria war, the United Nations has paid millions of dollars to the owners of a private Russian airline company who were barred from doing business with the organization 10 years ago over bribery charges. – New York Times

Hawks in Congress have long pushed the White House to consider more aggressive options in Syria from cruise missile strikes to no fly zones to humanitarian corridors. But during an off-the-record briefing on Capitol Hill on Thursday, a staffer for Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.) floated a distinctly bolder approach. “What about assassinating Assad?” the aide said, according to three individuals in the room. – Foreign Policy’s The Cable

An international inquiry has found that Syrian government forces were responsible for a third toxic gas attack, according to a confidential report submitted to the United Nations Security Council on Friday. The finding sets the stage for a showdown between Russia and Western members of the Council over how to respond. - Reuters

Syrian state media and opposition activists say government forces and their allies have captured a high point in the city of Aleppo where fighting with rebel groups resumed over the weekend. – Associated Press

The entire territory of Syria must be "liberated," Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman said in remarks televised Saturday, dismissing demands for Syrian President Bashar Assad's departure as "thoughtless." – Associated Press

Josh Rogin reports: Throughout the campaign, Hillary Clinton has pledged to ramp up U.S. action not only to fight the Islamic State, but also to end the Syrian civil war. If she does what she’s promising, the risky effort could engulf the first year of her presidency and test the limits of the United States’ reduced influence in the region. The question is whether she will follow through. – Washington Post

General John Allen, USMC (Ret.) and Charles Lister write: Bashar al-Assad is not the solution to the Syrian crisis, and he is the least-qualified possible partner in a fight against terrorism, having spent much of the past 16 years aiding and abetting al-Qaeda and, it would appear, the Islamic State as well. Action certainly presents risks, but to allow events to continue to unfold as they are means raising the cost yet further for a future, inevitable U.S. intervention. – Washington Post

Frederic Hof writes: The impending defeat of Daesh in Syria should not be wasted. Russia and its client regime have shut the door to diplomatic progress. Another should be opened, whether they like it or not. – Defense News

Max Boot writes: Moscow ultimately acquiesced in the Dayton Accords, and it likely would acquiesce in a settlement in Syria if the U.S. shows that it is serious about ending the war and ousting Assad. So far it hasn’t. All that Obama and Kerry have offered is a lot of empty verbiage without doing the hard work of laying the foundations for a durable peace. That task will await their successors. - Commentary

How ISIS Responds

10/21/2016

Defense One

ISIS fighters attack Kirkuk, diverting attention from Mosul
Jeffrey: America must prevent Iraq from falling apart again

Abe Greenwald: Cleaning up Obama’s foreign policy mess

Mosul Update

10/20/2016

Iraq’s elite counterterrorism unit joined the battle to recapture Mosul from the Islamic State for the first time on Thursday, as Iraqi army forces and Kurdish soldiers attacked the militants’ positions outside the city on several fronts. – Washington Post

As the operation to retake the Iraqi city of Mosul gets underway, American troops are poised to expand their hands-on support to local forces battling the Islamic State. In a sign of the importance of the long-awaited offensive, military leaders are authorized to place U.S. forces advisers with Iraqi army battalions for the first time as they push toward militant lines, exposing U.S. forces to greater risks. – Washington Post’s Checkpoint

The capital of the self-proclaimed Islamic State in Iraq is now under assault. But ISIS isn’t going anywhere. Instead, the the terror group is beginning to rebrand itself from a “caliphate” to an insurgency, a top U.S. general fighting ISIS said Wednesday. – The Daily Beast

The U.S. military is flying Apache helicopter gunships in support of Iraqi forces in the offensive to retake Mosul from ISIS, exposing U.S. forces to greater risk. – The Hill

The Iraqi Army is advancing into Mosul faster than expected, causing jihadist defenders to brace for defeat. – Washington Free Beacon

As U.S.-backed Iraqi forces open their offensive for the northern city of Mosul, an international rights group warned Tuesday that civilians fleeing Islamic State-held territory face potential violence from government troops and allied militias who it says have tortured, detained and killed people escaping militant-controlled areas in the past. – Roll Call

The offensive to seize back Mosul from Islamic State is going faster than planned, Iraq's prime minister said on Thursday, as Iraqi and Kurdish forces launched a new military operation to clear villages around the city. - Reuters

Iraqi special forces charged into the Mosul battle Thursday with a pre-dawn advance on a nearby town held by the Islamic State group, a key part of a multi-pronged assault on eastern approaches to the besieged city. – Associated Press

Residents began returning on Wednesday to the village of Sheikh Amir on the road to Mosul, recaptured overnight by advancing Kurdish fighters in the early days of the biggest advance that has been launched against Islamic State. They found a village rigged with explosives and dug in with elaborate underground defenses, abandoned by the Islamists who have retreated closer to Mosul, 30 km (19 miles) to the west. - Reuters

China's Investment in Pakistan: Very Risky

10/20/2016

Peterson Institute International Economics

U.S. Institute Peace: Pak/China Economic Corridor

Turks hit Dabiq: Hurting Islamic Mythology

10/18/2016

Dabiq is a city in Syria where final confrontation between Rome & Islam is to occur. It did yesterday.

To soften the symbolic blow, the Islamic State switched rhetorical gears, declaring that the real Dabiq battle would come some other time. The about-face was part of a larger repositioning as the Islamic State loses ground, not only in Syria but also in Iraq, where forces backed by the United States began a drive on Monday to push the group from the large, important city of Mosul. On the defensive in both countries, the group has been making preparations for retrenchment and survival. – New York Times

A member of Britain’s Special Air Service took a cue from 1992’s “Last of the Mohicans” and killed an Islamic State terrorist with an ax. – Washington Times

The nation's top military officer, Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford, on Monday convened military chiefs from nearly 50 countries for a conference on dealing with the aftereffects of defeating the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS). – The Hill

Tactically speaking, the village of Dabiq in northern Syria wasn't all that militarily significant. But when it was cleared of Islamic State fighters Saturday, its loss dealt a huge, humiliating defeat to the Islamic State. – Washington Examiner

Digital Revolutions, Fixing the Middle East & Iranian Aggression

10/18/2016

Project Syndicate

Why Iran Supplied Houthi Rebels in Yemen w/ Rockets: The Long War Journal

U.S. Concessions to Iran Becomes Aggression: Foreign Policy Initiative Total Intelligence

FPI Senior Policy Analyst Tzvi Kahn writes: Tehran and its proxies view the waning days of the Obama administration as an opportunity to pursue their interests with impunity. President Obama, the regime probably reasons, would hardly seek to escalate tensions with Iran, thereby threatening the nuclear deal, his signature foreign policy achievement, just as he leaves office. The next administration will suffer the consequences of this approach, taking power with fewer non-military options to counter Iranian aggression. – Foreign Policy Initiative

Interview: According to U.S. Navy officials, confrontations between American and Iranian naval vessels in the Persian Gulf have risen by roughly 50 percent. This despite the fact that the landmark Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) deal with Iran, which lifted nuclear sanctions on the country, was implemented in January 2016. The Cipher Brief sat down with former Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Jonathan W. Greenert, to find out why. – The Cipher Brief

India: New Policy of Realism

10/18/2016

Project Syndicate

Pakistan: Mecca of Terror

10/18/2016

Project Syndicate

Iranian Escalation in Red Sea & Saudi' Policy in Yemen

10/17/2016

Zimmerman, Estelle: Escalation in the Red Sea

The U.S. is investigating a possible new missile attack against a navy destroyer in the Red Sea off the coast of Yemen, the navy’s Middle East-focused branch said Sunday. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

A Saudi-led military coalition involved in Yemen’s war acknowledged on Saturday that one of its jets carried out an attack on a funeral this month in the Yemeni capital, Sana, that killed more than 100 people and wounded hundreds of others. – New York Times

Two Americans held in war-torn Yemen were freed and flown to Oman on Saturday in preparation for their return to the U.S., Oman’s government news agency said. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

Katherine Zimmerman and Emily Estelle write: The challenges facing the United States in the Red Sea and the region will continue to multiply rapidly. Iranians or their proxies are now challenging the U.S. Navy’s ability to operate freely in one of the world’s most important maritime chokepoints. American responses risk drawing the U.S. further into a complex regional and internal Yemeni war. The U.S. must stop compartmentalizing challenges and conflicts that are increasingly intersecting. A strategic and comprehensive view of these problems must replace the tactical and ad hoc approach that has characterized U.S. policy in the Middle East for so long. – AEI’s Critical Threats

Behnam Ben Taleblu writes: Iran’s security elites continue to see their regional rivalries through larger prisms like sectarianism and the global alliance structure. Therefore, the recent strike in Sanaa only serves as another data-point in the narrative-driven world view to which Tehran’s defense establishment subscribes. – Long War Journal

The top U.S. commander in the Middle East said he suspects Iran is playing a role in recent missile launches by Houthi rebels in Yemen against U.S. ships in the Red Sea. – The Hill

Iran has stepped up weapons transfers to the Houthis, the militia fighting the Saudi-backed government in Yemen, U.S., Western and Iranian officials tell Reuters, a development that threatens to prolong and intensify the 19-month-old war. - Reuters

Parties to the war in Yemen for the most part adhered to a 72-hour truce that began just before midnight on Wednesday and the capital Sanaa passed its first night in three months without air strikes, residents and officials said. - Reuters

Paul Bucala, et al. write: Iran almost certainly played a role in the missile attacks against the USS Mason near the Bab al Mandab Strait on October 9 and October 12. Senior U.S. administration officials asserted with “great confidence” that al Houthi forces were “unquestionably involved” in the missile strikes. – AEI’s Critical Threats

Mark Lagon writes: Saudi Arabia has been a problematic ally for a generation. In earlier eras, American dependence on its oil and strategic alignments in the Middle East have convinced policymakers they had very little room to change course. An unquestioning alliance with Saudi Arabia is no longer a necessary pill to swallow. It is time to reconsider partnerships that directly contradict not only our values—from women’s rights to religious freedom to executions—but our interests. – The National Interest

Mosul: The Advance is ON!

10/17/2016

Kurdish troops advance on ISIS-held villages east of Mosul
Mosul offensive poses key test of US strategy against ISIS
General Keane and James Jeffreyon the Mosul offensive

ISIS flees Syrian village where it prophesied doomsday battle

The tiny Syrian village of Dabiq was to have been the site of an apocalyptic showdown between Christian and Muslim armies, an Islamic version of the battle of Armageddon that would herald the end of the world, according to ancient prophecies embraced and trumpeted by the Islamic State. Instead of waging an epic battle, however, the last Islamic State fighters defending Dabiq fled Sunday without a fight in the face of an advance by a small force of Free Syrian Army rebels, backed by Turkey and by U.S. airstrikes. – Washington Post

After months of maneuvering, the Iraqi government’s battle to reclaim Mosul, the sprawling city whose million-plus population lent the most credence to the Islamic State’s claim to rule a fledgling nation, has finally begun. – New York Times

Kurdish forces on Monday morning began advancing on a string of villages east of Mosul, the start of a long-awaited campaign to reclaim Iraq’s second-largest city from the Islamic State, which seized it more than two years ago, officials said. – New York Times

When Iraqi forces roll toward the city of Mosul this month, local leaders will have an opportunity to close a painful chapter that began more than two years ago, when retreating army units abandoned the city to the Islamic State. The moment will also mark the culmination of two years of American efforts to build a reliable local fighting force, and present a key test of the Obama administration’s strategy for defeating the Islamic State. – Washington Post

Establishing functional governance in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul is going to be more of a challenge than winning an imminent battle to retake it from the Islamic State, former CIA Director and retired Gen. David Petraeus said on Sunday. – Washington Examiner

More than 50 people were killed Saturday in Iraq in attacks that struck a Shiite Muslim gathering, a police checkpoint and the family of a Sunni paramilitary leader opposed to the Islamic State, security and medical officials said. - Reuters

A suicide bomber struck a gathering of Shiite mourners in Baghdad Sunday, killing at least four people and wounding another 12, Iraqi officials said, as government troops prepared for a decisive battle to drive the Islamic State extremist group from the major northern city of Mosul. – Associated Press

Interview: On Sunday, the Iraqi Prime Minister announced the beginning of the campaign to wrest Mosul back from the Islamic State. The Cipher Brief talked with retired four-star General and Former Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army, John “Jack” Keane, to discuss the assault and the problems that may arise after Mosul has fallen. – The Cipher Brief

October 18, 2016
A force comprising thousands of Kurdish and Iraqi army soldiers wrested territory from the Islamic State outside the northern city of Mosul on Monday, facing occasionally fierce resistance at the start of a long-promised offensive to dislodge the extremists from their main stronghold in Iraq. – Washington Post

Iraqi Kurdish forces advancing toward the northern city of Mosul paused Tuesday on the second day of a long-awaited offensive after the Islamic State put up tough resistance in villages east of the strategic city. – Washington Post

As Iraqi forces launch their long-awaited campaign to retake the city of Mosul from the Islamic State, President Obama’s doctrine of aiding other countries militarily rather than leading every fight is facing its greatest test yet. – New York Times

The United Nations said it is gravely concerned for the safety of about 1.5 million civilians trapped in Mosul as the offensive to retake the city from Islamic State terrorists began. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

According to Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend, commander of the U.S.-led campaign in Iraq and Syria, the advancing forces will be buoyed by Western air support, artillery, intelligence, advisers and troops that will help call in airstrikes, known as forward air controllers. But what exactly does that look like? – Washington Post’s Checkpoint

Lawmakers emphasized the importance of retaking Mosul as the battle got underway on Monday, but criticized the administration for not having a plan once the city is back under Iraqi control. – Washington Examiner

The battle to retake Mosul from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) will likely last “weeks, possibly longer,” the commander of the U.S.-led coalition said Monday as the long-awaited offensive got underway. – The Hill

By the end of the first day of the highly anticipated offensive for the Iraqi city of Mosul, there were two wars—the one on the battlefield and the one fought in words by officials seeking to shape the most important battle ever against the self-proclaimed Islamic State. – The Daily Beast

Islamic State leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi survived an uprising within his own police force Monday as U.S. led-coalition forces pushed toward Mosul with only light resistance, according to Iraqi lawmakers. – Washington Free Beacon

Armed forces closing in on Mosul said on Tuesday they had secured some 20 villages on the outskirts of the city in the first 24 hours of an operation to retake what is Islamic State's last major stronghold in Iraq. - Reuters

Iraq and the United States have launched a crucial battle to liberate the city of Mosul without determining how its volatile region will be governed once Islamic State militants are ejected, U.S. and other officials said. - Reuters

More is riding on the battle for Mosul than the recapture of the Islamic State group's main stronghold in northern Iraq. Also on the line is the Obama administration's theory that the extremists can be defeated in Iraq, Syria and elsewhere without American ground troops doing the fighting. – Associated Press

Video: American Enterprise Institute Research Fellow Katherine Zimmerman on retaking the Islamic State’s stronghold and the battles to come – Wall Street Journal

Patrick Ryan and Patrick Johnson write: While policymakers should dedicate significant energy and resources to re-establishing governance and rebuilding the city’s shattered infrastructure and economy, the counter-ISIL coalition must first consolidate and fully exploit its initial military gains. The coalition cannot afford to repeat the mistakes of the last decade, allowing the group to survive under the radar only to re-establish influence and control. – War on the Rocks

October 19, 2016

Khalilzad: 8 decisive factors that will shape the battle for Mosul

The struggle for Mosul — which involves U.S. air power and an array of Iraqi ground forces — is the largest and most complex so far in the battle against Islamic State militants, who have been digging in for a fight. Residents who have recently fled the area and Iraqi officials with contacts inside the city say the Islamic State has been erecting concrete barricades and filling trenches with oil that can be set on fire to slow advancing forces. – Washington Post

The liberation of Mosul from the Islamic State group could also be the starting gun for the breakup of Iraq as the country faces re-emerging tensions along traditional sectarian and religious lines. – Washington Times

Zalmay Khalilzad writes: A successful campaign in Mosul has the potential to be an important milestone in the process of reconciliation, but only if the post-campaign period is given due attention. Otherwise, even victory in Mosul could ultimately just mark the beginning of a new phase of the Iraqi civil war. – The National Interest

"The Citadel" On Its Knees in Pakistan & Taliban Charge Through Afghanistan

10/14/2016

Editorial: The military will remain a driving force in Pakistani politics, and it’s unlikely that its intelligence arm will cease all support for terrorist groups. But the leak to Dawn suggests that at least a few senior officials are reassessing the costs of using jihadists as proxies to bleed their neighbors in India and Afghanistan. However the debate plays out, it is now impossible for Pakistanis to deny that their government remains a state sponsor of terror. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

The Long War Journal

The Long War Journal

The Times of India

The U.K. Telegraph

First Post India

The Oct. 3 battle is a microcosm of what is happening across Afghanistan: Taliban fighters that show enormous resilience despite being on the wrong side of a 15-year, $800 billion war; an Afghan army that still struggles with leadership, equipment, tactics and, in some units, an unwillingness to fight; and the world’s most sophisticated military reduced at times to pounding fields with its feared armaments. – Washington Post’s Checkpoint

With winter approaching in Afghanistan, Taliban militants there seem more determined than ever to expand their influence across the country. – Washington Post’s Checkpoint

Afghan government troops say they have fought Taliban forces to a standstill outside the capital of southern Helmand province, but the city remains surrounded after the insurgents launched one of their most brazen offensives. - Reuters

Saudi International Bond Auction & Beginning of Liberalizing Current/Capital Accounts, Yemeni war

10/13/2016

English Aawsat

Luttwak: Give War A Chance in Syria

10/13/2016

"Give War A Chance" Foreign Affairs
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What the Ancient Greeks & Sparta teach about Obama Doctrine: Hoover Institution

Cyber Brief Interview
Center for Strategic International Studies

Were Arabs Indigenous To Mandated Palestine?? & The P.L.O. Russian Relation, Abbas & Arafat Spies

10/12/2016

Middle East Forum

Middle East Forum

Palestinian Statehood Backgrounder

Iranian Proxies In Yemen, Navy Carrier Dwight Eisenhower & Central Command, The Long War & Iran Fires on U.S.

10/11/2016

AEI: Iranian Proxies in Yemen Get Aggressive

The Long War Journal: Hitting Radar Sites in Yemen

Future American military assistance to Saudi Arabia will hinge partly on whether the gulf kingdom embraces a U.S.-backed cease-fire with Houthi rebels in Yemen, officials said Thursday, as the Obama administration intensifies efforts to distance itself from a bloody bombing campaign. – Washington Post

So far, Pentagon officials are keen to not be drawn into a broader conflict. Rather they called Wednesday’s strike a self-defense measure. But at the same time, defense officials said they were prepared to strike again, should the Houthis threaten American—or even commercial—ships in the region’s waters. – The Daily Beast

A Saudi Arabia-led airstrike that hit a funeral in Yemen and killed more than 140 people is an apparent war crime, a leading human rights group said in a scathing report Thursday. – The Hill

Iran announced Thursday it had deployed two warships to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, where a U.S. Navy destroyer recently fired retaliatory strikes against Iran-backed Houthi rebel sites in Yemen. – The Hill

The Pentagon is tracking subjects believed to be responsible for popping off two missiles at the USS Mason and USS Ponce off the coast of Yemen on Sunday, and is considering taking strikes once they’re identified.

The missiles were launched from Houthi-held territory, Pentagon officials have confirmed, and the Mason did deploy two Standard Missile-2s and a single Enhanced Sea Sparrow Missile to intercept the incoming missiles, according to the US Naval Institute. It was the first time either self-defense system has been used to protect an American warship from incoming missiles -- making this a pretty big deal -- although Navy officials aren’t sure if the suspected Iranian-backed Houthi missiles were knocked down, or fell into the ocean on their own.

Defense officials tell Reuters they believe the rebels used “small skiffs as spotters to help direct” the attack, and “a radar station under Houthi control in Yemen might have also ‘painted’ the USS Mason, something that would have helped the Iran-aligned fighters pass along coordinates for a strike.”

The carrier Dwight D. Eisenhower is patrolling the waters of the Persian Gulf this fall as the single most powerful asset of US Central Command. After months of launching strikes against ISIS targets in Syria and Iraq, the ship is scheduled to be relieved in January by the carrier George H. W. Bush. Ike will then head home to Norfolk and complete a seven-month deployment. Keeping the deployment to that length is a key goal of the Navy, which is trying to avoid cruises turning into eight-nine-ten-month affairs that wear out people and equipment. – Defense News

Yemen

American warships will keep operating off the coast of Yemen, despite recently coming under fire by anti-government rebels in the country, possibly taking action against those forces should U.S. service members in the region come into harm’s way again. – Washington Times

Airstrikes on a funeral in Yemen on Saturday have inflamed local opinion, and Washington’s support for Saudi Arabia’s campaign against Houthi rebels has implicated the United States in civilian deaths, according to human rights groups. But there’s another potential side effect: It may have prompted the rebels to turn their weapons against U.S. forces. – Washington Post’s Checkpoint

The U.S. military is threatening to retaliate against Iranian-backed rebels in Yemen who are suspected of targeting an American warship in the Red Sea on Sunday. – Military Times

A Navy ship that came under fire from two missiles launched from rebel-held land in Yemen while it transited through international waters Sunday responded in self-defense with three missiles, a Defense Department official confirmed to Military.com. – Military.com

The Pentagon won’t rule out that Iranian missiles provided to rebels in Yemen were used to fire upon two U.S. warships in the Red Sea on Sunday, spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis said Tuesday. – Stars and Stripes

The United States is seeing growing indications that Iran-allied Houthi rebels, despite denials, were responsible for Sunday's attack on a Navy destroyer off the Yemen coast, U.S. officials told Reuters. - Reuters

The coalition seems to have been hoping to take out a significant part of the Houthis' military leadership and its allies, who were expected at the funeral. Instead, the attack is likely to deepen the stalemate in a war that has already pushed the impoverished country into collapse. – Associated Press

Afghan Seige of Kunduz & Bruce Riedel, Daniel Markey on Pakistan's Haqqani Network & Summary of Al Qaeda

10/11/2016

As Afghan forces struggle to break a weeklong Taliban siege of central neighborhoods in the provincial capital of Kunduz, insurgents are also stepping up pressure on urban centers in western and southern Afghanistan, officials said Sunday. – New York Times

When Taliban fighters penetrated the capital of Helmand province for the first time Monday, killing at least 14 people in a suicide bombing and related attacks, it was their most successful assault to date on the strategic southern city and opium trade center, which the insurgents have been trying to capture for months. – Washington Post

[T]he past decade of war against the Taliban has produced a new generation of disabled men, almost all still in their 20s. Many were injured during fighting in places such as Kunduz and Helmand provinces, which are in the news as targets of renewed Taliban offensives. And most are far more grievously wounded than the older veterans, because the explosive devices used by today’s insurgents are much more powerful. – Washington Post

The Afghan army, a force with inconsistent levels of competence and with nearly unsustainable casualty numbers, is increasingly relying on the commandos as stopgap cover in a campaign it — more often than not without external support — is losing. The reliance on the commandos risks both burning out the elite force and creating a sense of complacency within the regular army, according to U.S. advisers. – Washington Post’s Checkpoint

Pakistani envoys on a diplomatic mission to Washington [last] week gave a stern warning to President Obama: ignoring the conflict in Kashmir will hurt U.S.-Pakistani counterterrorism efforts against the Taliban. – Defense One

The Cypher Brief: Haqqani Network Pakistan

The Cypher Brief: Daniel Markey "Pakistan's Influence & Control"

The Cipher Brief: Bruce Riedel "The Haqqani Network in Pakistan: Effective & Brutal"

Dwindling Afghan forces face a resurgent Taliban

Afghanistan

In what appears to be one of the worst massacres of Afghan forces in a protracted and forgotten war, at least 100 were killed when the Taliban fighters opened fire on them from all directions as they tried to flee through the agreed-upon retreat route, Afghan officials said Wednesday. – New York Times

The Taliban pressed further into the capital of Helmand province on Wednesday, officials said, firing rockets at the governor’s compound as they threatened to overrun a second major Afghan city in just over a week. – Wall Street Journal (subscription required)

A second deadly attack on Shiite worshipers in two days killed at least 17 people and wounded 36 others when a remote-controlled bomb exploded outside a mosque in northern Afghanistan, as crowds in the capital and elsewhere gathered defiantly to commemorate one of Islam’s holiest days. – Washington Post

The Pentagon contracted with foreign companies that installed uncertified and possibly unsafe doors at the Ministry of Interior in Kabul, Afghanistan, raising concerns that the U.S. government was defrauded by firms working on the multi-million dollar construction project. – Washington Free Beacon

Afghan security forces cleared Kunduz of Taliban fighters Wednesday after more than a week of fighting in the northern city, which the insurgents had briefly captured and held last year, Afghan and U.S. officials said. – Stars and Stripes

For the past month, the Taliban have held control over most of Afghanistan's Helmand province, where the majority of the world's opium is grown — and as insurgent attacks intensify around the provincial capital, residents are blaming rampant government corruption for the rising militant threat. – Associated Press

Interview: The Cipher Brief’s Bennett Seftel spoke to Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, about his appraisal of al Qaeda, 15 years after the U.S. invaded Afghanistan in pursuit of the terrorists responsible for the 9/11 attacks. – The Cipher Brief

Preparing for the Assault on Mosul

10/11/2016

In Qayyarah, a town of about 15,000 people less than 20 miles south of Mosul, Islamic State’s self-declared capital, and elsewhere, tension exists in part because the families of some extremist fighters remained after the government regained control of the area. Relatives of extremists have taken some blame for the destruction wreaked upon the town, and many residents see no reason to stop holding them responsible even if they have done nothing wrong. – Los Angeles Times

The battle plans to oust the Islamic State from the city of Mosul are in place, but an uneasy mix of forces fighting against the militants could delay the fight or ignite separate conflicts. – Washington Post

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