Coalition forces target terrorist facilitators, suicide bombers; 13 killed, 27 detained

MNF-I is reporting that Monday, 24 December 2007, Coalition Forces (typically meaning Special Operations Forces when no unit is designated) killed 13 and detained 27 terrorist facilitators.

In Samarra, 3 terrorists were killed, 1 was wounded, and 15 detained.

During a series of operations south of Samarra Monday and today, Coalition forces targeted an alleged senior level foreign terrorist facilitator for al-Qaeda in Iraq.

In Mosul, 9 terrorists were killed and 1 detained.

Farther north in Mosul, Coalition forces targeted associates of an al-Qaeda in Iraq leader allegedly responsible for coordinating and directing numerous terrorist attacks in the region.

In Baghdad, 1 terrorist was killed, 1 was wounded, and 4 were detained.

In Baghdad Monday, Coalition forces targeted an alleged al-Qaeda member involved in bomb-making operations within the south Karkh car-bombing network.

In Hawija, 5 terrorists were detained.

Five suspected terrorists were detained south of Hawija today, during operations targeting an al-Qaeda leader for the network operating in Kirkuk.

While the numbers work out to 14 terrorist killed, 2 wounded, and 26 detained, the exact figures are unimportant. What is important, is visually placing these engagements on a map and understanding what is occuring.


General Petreous' counter-insurgency strategy needed to secure Baghdad (the internal ring) which is the center of gravity in Iraq. It was important to secure Baghdad so the Iraqi Government would be capable of functioning from a military perspective and Baghdad itself represented the largest concentrated part of the population in Iraq, which he needed to protect. This is where he initially focused his forces.

However, to truly secure Baghdad, he needed to flush the terrorists out of the rings around Baghdad (the second light green ring) to take away their safe havens and make it more difficult for the terrorists to conduct attacks in Baghdad.

This strategy forces terrorist (Al Qaeda) into the Kurdish region in the North, the Shia region in the South, the Anbar Province in the West (which had a developed Awakening movement) and towards Iran in the East.

One may look at this strategy and say that General Petreous only pushed insurgents out of Baghdad and put them in other provinces or regions. But this is the key to his strategy. As the terrorists are pushed further from Baghdad, they enter unfrinedly territory; Kurds in the North, Sunni Awakening Tribes in the West, Shia militia in the South, and Iran to the West (which Al Qaeda does not want to go into).

These areas are not friendly to Al Qaeda which is one reason why so many tips are now coming from Iraqis to Coalition Forces. This strategy keeps Al Qaeda from establishing a base of operations to regenerate and prevents support for Al Qaeda from the populous. These two keys points is why Al Qaeda has not been able to come off the defensive and is constantly getting defeated in Iraq.

Hold ground and fight against the Coalition and Al Qaeda will surely die. Move into unfriendly territory and Al Qaeda will surely die.

I also drew a bomb blast in the south to represent COL Tom James' Brigade operating South of Baghdad toward Babel where recent action has occurred.

The blue arrows represent the ratlines Al Qaeda is using in an attempt to infiltrate back into Baghdad.

As you can see from the map, General Petreous is attacking Al Qaeda in Baghdad, along all ratlines, and is making them watch their rear as they are pushed into unfrinedly territory.

Major battles are likely to occur in Mosul and Kirkuk in the near future as Al Qaeda is attempting to hide and regenerate its forces while receiving support among friendly Sunni people in these cities. However, since these regions are also Kurdish influenced, I suspect Al Qaeda will not be able to hide for very long as two of the above operations occurred outside of Mosul and Kirkuk.

Al Qaeda's back is against the wall. They have not been able to melt back into the population as they no longer enjoy support from the population, which prevents them from regenerating, which in turn prevents them from mounted coordinated attakcs. Their only other choice is to stand their ground, fight, and die.

The MNF-I article along with the graphic shows how the Coalition is enveloping Al Qaeda in Iraq by pushing them out of Baghdad, the belts, and into unfriendly territory. Al Qaeda cannot sustain and replace losses of roughly 40 of its members daily, several of them key leaders. They are being pushed out of safe havens and hence do not have ready access to caches from which to mount spectacular attacks.

This fact shows they are beginning to lose the information war that they have so well used up until now. They have already been defeated militarily. Not having a base of operations also hurts them economically. Awakening movements and CLCs are hurting them diplomatically. All the elements our power are finally coming together to see the wholesale defeat Al Qaeda in Iraq.

Now is definitely not the time to withdraw our forces from this region. Now is definitely not the time to withhold money for troops and continuing operations in Iraq. Now is the time to fully continue to press to destroy Al Qaeda in Iraq which will subsequently weaken Al Qaeda in general as they have made Iraq their central front in this war.