Defense leaders at a counter-Islamic State meeting expressed concerns about what happens after the expected defeat of the militant group, and whether countries are ready to help stabilize and rebuild the war-torn cities, particularly in Iraq, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said Wednesday.
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But he warned this would not eliminate their violent ideology or ability to spring attacks elsewhere. “Progress against Daesh (IS) has now put liberation of Mosul strongly on the agenda”, the top United Nations official in Iraq said last week.
Senator Payne sat down with her USA counterpart Ash Carter on the sidelines of meetings in Washington DC, with the secretary of defense thanking Australia for its recent decision to increase its training mission.
“The Secretary and the Minister agreed to keep in touch in the days and weeks ahead”, Cook said.
“But the momentum – there is nobody at this table who would argue that the momentum hasn’t shifted – it has shifted”, he said, sitting with allied foreign ministers.
The militants seized control of the city in June 2014 after Iraqi security forces fled the ISIS advance, and retaking it has been a key priority for the coalition because of its symbolism and strategic importance for ISIS as a taxation base and safe haven.
Given its recent success, they will likely use a “starburst” attack, a US military official said, thrusting to the centre with air strikes and then attacking IS defences from behind.
“We’re now at a point where we want to bring the coalition together to talk it through, look at the details and make sure we have what we need to give us the best chance we have to succeed”, Brett McGurk, the Special Presidential Envoy to the Coalition to Counter Islamic State, told reporters Tuesday.
McGurk has been painting ISIS in Iraq and Syria as a weakening terrorist group on a downward spiral, despite the spate of attacks linked to the jihadist organization that killed and wounded hundreds during the holy Muslim month of Ramadan, as well as before and after.
“While Qayara is an important milestone for the Iraqis, they still have a long way to go to reach the outskirts of Mosul, and then the bigger challenge is to cordon off south of Mosul”, said a source in the Kurdistan regional security council.
The move in Afghanistan mimics the USA approach toward the air war against the Islamic State, where commanders have much more latitude to decide which targets to go after.
The coalition, which has conducted 14,000 strikes in two years, is “succeeding on the ground”.
“Because it is losing ground, it is incentivized to carry out attacks overseas to stay in the media’s eye”, said William McCants, an expert on the Islamic world and violent extremism at the Brookings Institution, a public policy think tank in Washington. “ISIS is down but not out”.
Washington maintains that since its peak in 2014 IS has lost almost 50 percent of the Iraqi territory it conquered and between 20 and 30 percent of its Syrian strongholds.
Carter said from discussions that morning with coalition defense ministers “it was very encouraging” over what additional support was to be provided “from strike aircraft through to training and vital work in logistics, stabilization and other aspects”.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry (R) gestures to German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier during a Pledging Conference in Support of Iraq, co-hosted by the United States, Canada, Germany, Japan, Kuwait, and The Netherlands at the State Department in Washington, U.S., July 20, 2016.
He also noted the need to ensure “economic and political campaigns do not lag behind” military operations.
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Last week, the United States committed an additional 560 troops to help shape the fight for Mosul, and an official told VOA the US will ask other coalition countries to “maintain current contributions and provide additional contributions to fill in any gaps”.
