Baghdad in trouble if Anbar falls to Daesh

Baghdad: Daesh militants are threatening to overrun a key province in western Iraq in what would be a major victory for the militants and an embarrassing setback for the US-led coalition targeting the group.

A win for Daesh in Anbar province would give the militants control of one of the country’s most important dams and several large army installations, potentially adding to their abundant stockpile of weapons. It would also allow them to establish a supply line from Syria almost to Baghdad, and give them a valuable position from which to launch attacks on the Iraqi capital.

Daesh’s offensive in Anbar has received less attention than its assault on the Syrian border city of Kobani, which has played out in view of news photographers standing on hills in nearby Turkey. But in recent weeks, Daesh fighters have systematically invaded towns and villages in Anbar, besieged army posts and police stations, and mounted attacks on Iraqi troops in Ramadi, the provincial capital.

Daesh had already secured a major foothold in Anbar province in January, when it seized the city of Fallujah and parts of Ramadi. It pushed farther into the province in June. Still, Iraq’s government was able to maintain small pockets of authority in the majority-Sunni region.

Iraqi forces have suffered numerous reverses in the latest militant offensive, including the loss of two army bases. US warplanes and attack helicopters have hit Daesh targets and provided support to Iraqi troops fighting in Anbar. The US airstrikes helped fend off an assault last month on the Haditha dam, part of the militants’ drive to control Iraq’s water supplies. But overall, the strikes have failed to curb the militants’ momentum.

“If Daesh controls Anbar, they would be able to threaten serious targets in Baghdad,” said an Iraqi security expert, Saeed Al Jayashi. “The government would lose the Haditha dam, and the security forces would have to retreat,” he said. “There would be a bloodbath.”

Anbar province — Iraq’s largest — was the epicentre of the bloody Sunni insurgency against US forces that raged after the invasion in 2003. In 2006, Anbar’s numerous Sunni tribes decided to back the US-supported government against Iraq’s Al Qaida affiliate, in what later became known as the Sunni Awakening. The insurgency was crushed.

But in recent years, the sectarian policies of former Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki, a Shiite, alienated the Sunni tribes and their constituencies.

Daesh, which had been founded as an offshoot of Al Qaida in Iraq, fed off the Sunni discontent. At the same time, the militants improved their military prowess by fighting in the civil war in Syria. They have seized large chunks of Syria and Iraq.

Since the beginning of the US campaign against Daesh in August, US warplanes and helicopters have struck more than 40 targets in Anbar province, according to data from the US military’s Central Command.

The Obama administration had expressed hope that Sunni Arab powers in the region, led by Saudi Arabia, would persuade the Anbar tribes to turn against Daesh and join Iraqi government forces or participate in a locally based national guard.

But although Al Maliki left office early last month, there has been little indication that Arab influence, if indeed it is being used, has had much of an effect. At the same time, Sunni tribesmen have said they feel threatened by the Shiite militias that are participating in Iraq’s fight against Daesh.

In talks last week with retired US Gen John Allen, the administration’s coordinator of the international coalition against Daesh, tribal leaders said “they will not confront Daesh while Shiite militias exist in Sunni areas”, tribal chief Sami Al Mohammadi told the Saudi-owned London newspaper Al Hayat.

Anbar province, a vast expanse of desert crisscrossed by truck routes leading to Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Syria, holds both strategic and symbolic significance for Daesh.

If the extremist group captures the territory, it could funnel weapons and fighters from areas it controls in Syria all the way to the western outskirts of Baghdad. Currently, that supply line is interrupted by government-held Haditha and Ramadi.

The militants would also extend their de facto border to just outside the Iraqi capital.

“It will be a base for their movements. It would take a very long time to get it back,” said Anbar’s police chief, Ahmad Saddak Al Dulaimi.

The capture of Anbar would also be a psychological victory for the militants.

Anbar “is really the birthplace of ISIS’ predecessor organisation, Al Qaida in Iraq,” said Jessica Lewis, research director at the Institute for the Study of War in Washington, using a common name for Daesh. “So, taking the cities of Anbar province is quite important to ISIS.”

Security officials in Anbar say Daesh has been bolstering its fighting force in the province.

In the past few days, the militants have wrested control of the Anbar town of Hit on the Euphrates River, as well as the nearby town of Kubaisa. Both are close to the Ain Al Assad military base, one of Iraq’s largest. It sends reinforcements and supplies to troops defending the Haditha Dam just northwest of the camp.

According to a recent assessment by the Institute for the Study of War, Daesh has conducted a “sophisticated campaign” in Anbar in the past four weeks, which has enabled the group to control most of the territory from the Syrian border to Abu Ghraib in the western suburbs of Baghdad.

The militants have severed the Iraqi army’s supply lines, cut off troops’ communications, and consolidated gains that would not be easily disrupted by an air campaign, the report said.

Perhaps most alarming is the militants’ advance on Ramadi, 80 miles west of Baghdad.

Iraqi media outlets reported on Monday that security forces had withdrawn from central Ramadi, a claim that Al Dulaimi, the police chief, later denied. But attacks over the past week have left the militants in control of new neighbourhoods in the city.

Local officials have warned the central government that Ramadi may soon fall.

“All of the areas around Ramadi are controlled by Daesh,” said Ahmad Abu Risha, a prominent tribal shaikh who commands pro-government fighters in the area.

Abu Risha said his forces, who are lightly armed, have received no air support while fighting off Daesh .

“If Ramadi falls, all of Anbar falls,” he said. “Ramadi is the head. If you cut the head, the rest of the body will die, too.”

One of the most important losses for the Iraqi security forces was the military camp at Saqlawiyah. Daesh fighters surrounded the base west of Fallujah last month. Some of the soldiers there fled, while the militants are believed to have massacred many others, according to survivors. Between 300 and 500 soldiers were missing, they said. The militants subsequently seized a military base at Albu Aytha, 50 miles from Baghdad.

“For days we begged for airstrikes and they never came,” said a 38-year-old soldier who survived the onslaught at Saqlawiyah, and gave his name only as Abu Ali, for fear of retribution.

Now, he says, he doesn’t believe there is anything worth fighting for in Anbar.

“The leadership doesn’t care about us, the people there [in Anbar] don’t care about us. They called us Shiite dogs,” he said. “How can I fight for any of them after this?”

Jayashi, the analyst, said that Anbar residents needed to support the Iraqi security forces.

“Otherwise,” he said, “we will lose all of western Iraq.”