Iraqi commander ordered troops out of Ramadi unnecessarily, leading to city’ fall

Iraqi commander ordered troops out of Ramadi unnecessarily, leading to city’ fall

Published 18 June 2015

 

The capture of Ramadi, the capital of Iraq’s Anbar province, by Islamic State militants made headlines, and was perceived used by ISIS’s savvy media machine as a demonstration of the organization’s military capabilities, but military analysts say the jihadists took over the city because an Iraqi commander unnecessarily ordered his forces to withdraw. “Ramadi was lost because the Iraqi commander in Ramadi elected to withdraw. In other words, if he had elected to stay, he would still be there today,” says a British army’s brigadier. U.S.-led efforts to build up the Iraqi military so it can retake Ramadi and Mosul are stalled because not enough Iraqis enlist.

The capture of Ramadi, the capital of Iraq’s Anbar province, by Islamic State militants made headlines, and was perceived used by ISIS’s savvy media machine as a demonstration of the organization’s military capabilities, but military analysts say the jihadists took over the city because an Iraqi commander unnecessarily ordered his forces to withdraw.
“Ramadi was lost because the Iraqi commander in Ramadi elected to withdraw. In other words, if he had elected to stay, he would still be there today,” the British army’s Brigadier Christopher Ghika told journalists in Baghdad on Wednesday.
“Ramadi was not a DAESH victory — DAESH did not win Ramadi, DAESH did not fight and defeat the Iraqi army in Ramadi,” Ghika said, using an Arabic acronym for ISIS.
Islamic State now controls about a third of Iraq.
The Guardian reports that the Iraqi military has been weakened by corruption and incompetent leaders. Many of the senior commanders have been appointed by Nuri al-Maliki, the former prime minister of Iraq, at the insistence of Iran, with both Maliki and Iran preferring to promote loyal Shi’a officers to key military positions regardless of their military experience and competence.
“It was the Anbar Ops commander [who gave the order],” Ghika said, referring to the head of the military command responsible for Anbar province.
Staff Major General Mohammed Khalaf al-Fahdawi was acting head of Anbar Operations Command when Ramadi fell, after the commander had been injured. Fahdawi said he could not comment on Ghika’s accusations because he did not have permission to speak about the issue.
Ramadi fell to ISIS in mid-May after government forces had held out against militants there for more than a year. It was the Iraqi military’s worst defeat in months and came after Iraqi forces and Shi’a militias pushed ISIS back to recapture significant territory in two provinces north of Baghdad.
In Baghdad on Wednesday, U.S. Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter urged the Iraqi government to send more recruits to American-run training camps, noting that the number of Iraqis volunteering for service keeps dwindling.
The United States and Iraq have agreed that U.S. military instructors would train about 24,000 Iraqi security forces by the beginning of fall so they can be sent to push ISIS back from its positions in Anbar province. So far, however, less than half that number of Iraqis showed up at the training camp, as only about 7,000 candidates for the military and 2,000 candidates for the newly formed “anti-terrorist forces” have enrolled for training, Carter told the House Armed Services Committee.
“As I’ve told Iraqi leaders, while the United States is open to supporting Iraq more than we already are, we must see a greater commitment from all parts of the Iraqi government,” Carter said.
Middle East Eye notes that Iraq’s military has been weakened and demoralized ever since multiple divisions collapsed and their soldiers fled in the face of an ISIS offensive last year.
Iran-trained Shi’a militias and Kurdish Peshmerga forces have been called on to stand in for the Iraqi military in operations aiming to reclaim territory from ISIS. The Kurdish forces performed well, even when only lightly armed, but the Shi’a militias and their Iranian commanders proved no match for ISIS, and were withdrawn.
Another troubling aspect of using the Shi’a militias against ISIS was that while they were ineffective fighting ISIS militants, the militias – and more than a few units of the Iraqi army – used the opportunity of venturing into the Sunni Anbar province in pursuit of ISIS to settle scores: they killed many Sunni civilians – often targeting village and community leaders and religious figures – and robbed businesses and private homes before retreating.
Carter and General Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff, told the House committee that they have not ruled out increasing US troop support for Iraq, but said such an increase requires the Iraqi military brings a larger force to battle ISIS.
Introducing more American troops is a subject the United States will “need to revisit as those [Iraqi] forces are actually produced,” Carter said.
American forces could assist in anti-ISIS campaigns, such as a new effort to retake Mosul, but Dempsey stressed that such support should not be a crutch for the Iraqi government.
“The introduction of those resources should not be done on a habitual basis because we want them to understand this is their fight,” Dempsey said.
“I would not recommend that we put US forces in harm’s way simply to stiffen the spine of local forces,” he said.
“If their spine is not stiffened by the threat of ISIL on their way of life, nothing we do is going to stiffen their spine,” said Dempsey, using another acronym for ISIS.
In the meantime, in a move which is not going to foster better relations among Iraq’s different ethnic communities, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi is seeking to authorize the Ministry of Justice to execute more than 7,000 Sunni prisoners.
The prisoners were sentenced to death, but under Iraq’s new constitution, capital punishment requires presidential authorization, and al-Abadi has thus far refused to do so.
The 7,000 condemned men have been reportedly convicted of “terror” related charges, but many commentators have questioned the charges and whether the men were given due process.