Update for Tuesday, July 11, 2017

Haider al-Abadi has once again claimed victory in Mosul, but fighting continues. "Plumes of smoke rose into the air Tuesday as IS mortar shells landed near Iraqi positions, and heavy gunfire could be heard on the western edge of the Old City."

Amnesty International says Iraqi and coalition tactics in Mosul violated international law  and may amount to war crimes. "The rights group said in a report the Islamic State militant group had also flagrantly violated humanitarian law by deliberately putting civilians in harm's way to shield their fighters and impede the advance of Iraqi and coalition forces." Although the government forces  faced an impossible situation in trying to avoid civilian casualties, AI particularly criticizes use of "Improvised Rocket Assisted Munitions (IRAMs), weapons with crude targeting capabilities that wreaked havoc in densely populated areas."

Iraq's elite Counterterrorism Service suffered 40% casualties in the Mosul battle, according to the U.S. Department of Defense. Iraqi spokesmen say that figure is exaggerated. (This includes soldiers lost to injury, as well as combat deaths.)

The generally reliable Syrian Observatory for Human Rights says that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is indeed dead.

An IS leader in Hawija proclaims himself "emir." This report suggests likely infighting within the remnants of IS following Baghdadi's death. However, the IS news service has yet to confirm the report that he is dead. Infighting is also reported in Tal Afar. The latter city is believed to be the next target for Iraqi forces.

Update for Monday, July 10, 2017

You may be wondering why I didn't post yesterday as PM Abadi declared "victory" in Mosul. It's because  he made the declaration for no particular reason, as fighting in Mosul continues.

Fighting in Mosul may end today, however.

Al Bawaba has a roundup of info and photos. The devastation and human toll are incalculable.

Update for Saturday, July 8, 2017

A correspondent informs me that the new policy of not announcing the deaths of U.S. troops in Afghanistan until after next of kin have been notified is controversial among military families and their advocates. I wanted to look at this more fully. NBC news has a good backgrounder. The policy was purportedly decided by Gen. John Nichols, commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, and applies only to that theater. The policy elsewhere, still including Iraq and Syria, and historically everywhere since Viet Nam, has been to announce promptly that deaths have occurred, but not to provide identifying information or much specific information about the incident until after next of kin have been notified. From the NBC report:

Captain William Salvin, the director of public affairs for Resolute Support, said that Gen. Nicholson decided to change the policy to protect the families of the fallen and of those who continue to serve in the warzone. Nicholson wants to make sure the families have been notified and have their support systems in place before the U.S. military in Kabul informs the public that an incident has occurred . . .
But while there are fewer U.S. service members in Iraq and Syria than in Afghanistan, the ground commander in Baghdad continues to send out a notification when an incident results in a U.S. death.
And one senior defense official warned that Nicholson's new policy will mean less transparency and more ambiguity about the war in Afghanistan at a time when many Americans don't know what is happening there. "It's a step in the wrong direction," the official said.. . .
Another senior defense official expressed concern about the new policy because it may mean that Afghans become the initial source of information about American casualties. "It's just not appropriate and it's not the way we have been doing things for more than a decade," the official said.

 However, I have not yet found commentary from active duty troops, veterans, or military families.

Tribal elder is killed by a bomb placed in his car in Nangarhar. Four other civilians are wounded.

Taliban carry out a coordinated attack on highway checkpoints in Parwan. Little information so far, no reports of military or civilian casualties.

Drone strikes in Nangarhar said to kill numerous IS and Taliban.

In Iraq, civilians displaced from Mosul swelter in camps without electricity, ponder how they will rebuild their lives with their city destroyed.

Iraqi TV says last IS defenses in Mosul are collapsing, predicts imminent victory.

Note, however, that IS still controls the Kurdish town of Hawija, and towns to the west of Mosul including Tal Afar. Presumably Iraqi government and allied forces will turn to them next -- the conventional war in Iraq is not over.

AP has a photo gallery from Mosul showing the devastation and human cost. Warning: this includes many grim and gruesome images, including corpses and injured children. These are a lot of high quality pics, so it takes a long time to load.

Update for Wednesday, July 5, 2017

U.S. soldier is killed in action Monday afternoon by mortar fire in Helmand province. Two other soldiers are injured, and are being treated locally. The deceased is identified as Private First Class Hansen Kirkpatrick of Wasilla, Alaska. This delayed announcement is somewhat unusual.

Update: It turns out the delayed announcement is a new policy. The military will not announce combat deaths until after the family has been notified.

Paranoid, are we? A teenage female robotics team from Afghanistan is refused visas to attend a competition in the U.S. Oddly, teams from Syria and Iran will be admitted.

A group of U.S. senators visiting Afghanistan decries lack of a coherent strategy, and failure to fill essential State Department positions including that of U.S. ambassador to Afghanistan.

In Iraq, it's going to cost a billion dollars just to repair the basic infrastructure in Mosul. And by the way, that hasn't even started in the Anbar cities.

The editors of The Economist discuss the state of Iraq as IS falls. They are discouraged:

Iraqi ministers estimate that rehabilitating areas liberated from IS will cost $100bn, roughly the sum they and the Americans spent on the war. But the government is broke. Sunni Gulf states are said to be considering their involvement, but have contributed next to nothing. The World Bank has reportedly committed $300m. Germany is offering €500m ($570m). Coalition talks on a ten-year reconstruction plan, set to begin in Washington on July 10th, might drum up a bit more. But, runs an Arabic proverb, commitments are clouds, implementation the rain. . . .

IS’s vestiges, though, may anyway be one of the lesser problems facing Iraq. Exultant armies and militias now occupy the ground once held by the caliphate. A generation of young Iraqis currently earn a living from fighting IS; they may now develop ambitions of their own. Having avoided confrontation while they were assaulting IS, America and its allies are now coming to blows with Iran and its allies across the border in south-eastern Syria. A similar struggle looms in Iraq. Meanwhile, Iraq’s politicians squabble, largely confined to the Green Zone, the walled city within a city occupying the core of Baghdad. So far there is not much sign of the fresh dawn that IS’s downfall should bring.

Must read for Friday, June 30, 2017

I'm going to ask you to read this, by Major Danny Sjursen, U.S. Army, in TomDispatch.

As I hope readers have figured out by now, I see absolutely no case for a U.S. military presence in Afghanistan. Neither does Major Sjursen. Do read, but I'll just give you this pull quote:

Remember something: this won’t be America’s first Afghan “surge.”  Or its second, or even its third.  No, this will be the U.S. military’s fourth crack at it.  Who feels lucky?  First came President George W. Bush’s "quiet" surge back in 2008.  Next, just one month into his first term, newly minted President Barack Obama sent 17,000 more troops to fight his so-called good war (unlike the bad one in Iraq) in southern Afghanistan.  After a testy strategic review, he then committed 30,000 additional soldiers to the “real” surge a year later.  That’s what brought me (and the rest of B Troop, 4-4 Cavalry) to Pashmul district in 2011.  We left -- most of us -- more than five years ago, but of course about 8,800 American military personnel remain today and they are the basis for the surge to come. . . .
, there are two things the upcoming “mini-surge” will emphatically not do:
*It won’t change a failing strategic formula.
Imagine that formula this way: American trainers + Afghan soldiers + loads of cash + (unspecified) time = a stable Afghan government and lessening Taliban influence.
It hasn’t worked yet, of course, but -- so the surge-believers assure us -- that’s because we need more: more troops, more money, more time.  Like so many loyal Reaganites, their answers are always supply-side ones and none of them ever seems to wonder whether, almost 16 years later, the formula itself might not be fatally flawed. . . .

Update for Thursday, June 29, 2017

Iraqi forces enter the ruins of al-Nuri mosque in Mosul. However, resistance continues.
“Counter-Terrorism Service forces control the Nuri mosque and Al-Hadba (minaret),” the Joint Operations Command said in a statement. After a senior special forces commander said the mosque had not in fact been retaken, the operations command clarified that it meant Iraqi forces had isolated the area and were “advancing toward the completion of the goals.”

IS continues to hold civilians in its remaining territory to slow the Iraqi advance.

An analysis finds IS revenue has plunged by 80%  in large part due to territorial losses. However, it will be some time before its territory is completely eliminated:

“The Islamic State’s remaining caliphate is likely to break up before the end of the year, reducing its governance project to a string of isolated urban areas that will eventually be retaken over the course of 2018,” said Columb Strack, senior Middle East analyst at IHS Markit.

Canada extends its military mission in Iraq through at least March 2019.

No surprise, the exciting new Pentagon strategy to fight IS is essentially the same strategy they already had. 

U.S. House Armed Services Committee drafts bill that would cut off funds for Kurdistan if it secedes from Iraq. However, as some U.S. politicians have advocated for devolution, it is not clear whether the full congress will support this.

The KRG representation office in Washington made it clear it took issue with the language, calling it “inartful” and pointing out that the language is nonbinding and may not survive reconciliation with the Senate version of the bill. “It is the democratic right of the people of Kurdistan to hold a referendum on their future,” an official with the KRG office told Al-Monitor, “and no one that we have met in Congress has denied this fact.”

Update for Wednesday, June 28, 2017

As the battle for Mosul enters the end game, thousands of civilians remain trapped in the remaining IS-held territory under increasingly desperate circumstances.

IRIN reports that many are sheltering in basement bunkers constructed during the Saddam Hussein era to protect against possible U.S. air strikes. However, they are vulnerable to strikes from modern U.S. bombs.

Defeat in Mosul will not eliminate IS from Iraq. IS still holds towns west of Mosul, including Tal Afar where excavation of a tunnel is said to have caused the collapse of a house, killing the inhabitants.

Farah Najjar, reporting for al Jazeera, discusses the likely persistence of IS ideology following the collapse of the self-proclaimed Caliphate. She interviewed Rami Khouri:

Khouri said that unless underlying regional issues such as unemployment, human rights abuses and political repression are addressed, the group's ideology will continue to attract the disenfranchised and politically excluded.

Oxford Research Group also discusses the IS future.

The recapture of territory from IS is only the beginning of the existential challenge facing Iraq. One question is the status and security of Christians; whether the Shiite dominated Baghdad government will legitimately serve and govern the Sunni Arab minority; and of course the now seemingly inevitable declaration of independence of Iraqi Kurdistan.

Parallel problems face Syria, of course. The dissolution of the Sykes-Picot map of the Middle East is just beginning, and will likely unfold amid continued political turmoil and violence for a long time to come.