ISIS suffers heaviest defeat as Iraqi forces ‘liberate’ Diyala province from Jihadis’

January 27, 2015 | By hromedia | Reply More

Jan 27, – The first signs are emerging that a combination of coalition airstrikes and more assertive Iraqi and Kurdish forces are forcing ISIS to change its behavior and inflicting serious losses of both territory and fighters.

It controls vast areas of northern and western Iraq, as well as much of northeastern Syria, and exercises draconian authority in areas as far apart as Anbar in western Iraq and Aleppo province in northern Syria. ISIS also continues to pick up endorsements and pledges of allegiance from other jihadist groups, most notably in Libya and Egypt.

But there are signs that ISIS is under stress, especially in Iraq, with its lines of communication and resupply disrupted in some areas, key figures targeted in airstrikes and sources of revenue under threat.

Lauren Squires, a researcher with the Institute for the Study of War who has followed the group closely, said, “ISIS is facing the unhappy experience of losing the element of surprise.”

“Mosul fell in June because no one thought Mosul would fall. … ISIS has capitalized on the Iraqi and Western governments not expecting it to be as quick and aggressive as it has been.

Now, the group’s strengths and weaknesses are perhaps better understood.

U.S. President Barack Obama said in an interview over the weekend that the next phase of the campaign against ISIS was imminent. “The airstrikes have been very effective in degrading ISIL’s capabilities and slowing the advance that they were making, “Face the Nation.”

“Now, what we need is ground troops, Iraqi ground troops that can start pushing them back,” he said, supported by an expansion in the U.S. training and advising mission.

‘Afraid to congregate’

Airstrikes by U.S. and coalition aircraft in Iraq (and U.S. strikes in Syria) are often no more than a handful per day, hampered by poor weather and the need to avoid civilian casualties. But the strikes appear to have limited ISIS’ freedom of movement and destroyed some of its military hardware, as well as oil refineries that are a source of income.

Last week, Gen. Lloyd Austin, who heads U.S. Central Command, said ISIS ”are afraid to congregate in any sizable formation.”

“They know if we can see them, we’re going to engage them, and we’re going to hit what we’re aiming at,” he told a forum at the Atlantic Council in Washington.

Squires echoes that: “ISIS is exhibiting signs of stress, as they seldom move and maneuver in large convoys anymore. We’ve seen pictures of ISIS moving on motorcycles and in single trucks, as opposed to the summer, when they moved in convoys.”

Recent strikes also suggest Iraqi and coalition targeting is benefiting from better intelligence about the movement of senior ISIS figures. This week, Iraqi television claimed that an aide to ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed in an airstrike on Fallujah, days after the U.S. said it had targeted a convoy of high-profile ISIS figures near Mosul.

ISIS itself has obliquely acknowledged the impact of airstrikes, releasing a video this week about the value of trenches and underground shelters. A fighter in a shelter near Fallujah said, “If airplanes are observed in the sky, the brothers can hide themselves until the airplanes are gone,” according to a translation by the SITE Intelligence Group.

Press journalist for HRO media – Khizer Hayat reports