What's different about the Tal-Afar operation is that the Iraqi government is taking the lead.

Belmount Club ^ | Saturday, September 10, 200 | wretchard

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

What's different about the Tal-Afar operation is that the Iraqi government is taking the lead.

Iraq's prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, announced the start of the offensive in a statement yesterday morning. "At 2am today, acting on my orders, Iraqi forces commenced an operation to remove all remaining terrorist elements from the city of Tel Afar," he said. "These forces are operating with support from the Multinational Force."

Tal-Afar, the area in which the operation is taking place, is located just east of the Sinjar Mountains (Jabal Sinjar), a prominent ridge along the Syrian border, and southwest of the mountainous border with Turkey, placing it across a channel between Syria and Mosul. The Guardian

adds that this may be a prelude to further operations.

Amid warnings from senior Iraqi government officials that assaults were also planned for the cities of Samarra and Ramadi, troops in Tal Afar battered down walls with armoured vehicles as they conducted house-to-house searches. ... At a news conference later in the day, Jaafari said that the insurgents wanted 'to isolate Tal Afar from the political process as we are preparing for the referendum on the draft constitution ... so our duty is to protect the country and spare no effort in helping all Iraqi people.'

The New York Times adds that these steps are part of an effort to control the Syrian border.

For days, American and Iraqi forces have been encircling Tal Afar, skirmishing with the guerrillas who control the city, in preparation for a final assault. That push began at 2 a.m. on Saturday when the first Iraqi brigades began moving in, Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari said. On Saturday evening, as fighting died down, Iraq's interior minister, Bayan Jabr, announced that the border with Syria had been closed in Rabia, near Tal Afar. A curfew was imposed, with all travel in and out of Rabia between 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. strictly forbidden. ...

The offensive was led by the Iraqi Army's Third Division, officials said ... After the operation is complete, the police commandos will maintain control of the city temporarily, then eventually cede authority to a new police force of 1,700 officers, including 1,000 recruited from Tal Afar, said Mr. Jabr, the interior minister.

First up the rivers, now the border. The pattern of campaigning against the insurgents began with an attempt to control the Euphrates and Tigris river lines moving northward from Baghdad. The current emphasis has been upon controlling the Syrian border, on which both the river lines are anchored. Over the last several months, US forces have laid down the logistical infrastructure for moving men and equipment rapidly into the space north of the Euphrates going eastward to the Tigris, a process described in the post Battle for the Border.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

We are winning....an outstanding piece to REALLY understand the Iraqi war!

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