Operation Featherweight: Month 9, Week 3, Day 3.

On Sunday (12/4/15) the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) repelled an attack by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) on the Baiji oil refinery located around 55km (33 miles) north of the city of Tikrit. On Monday (13/4/15) ISIL launched another attack on the oil refinery.

This attack was more successful with ISIL succeeding not only in breaching the perimeter but also in seizing a number of key areas inside the compound including the main garrison defending the site where Major Gen. Dhaif Khalaf - the garrison commander was killed. In an effort to repel Sunday's assault the US-led coalition eventually began carried out 6 air-strikes against ISIL destroying and mixture of ground units and fighting positions. This continued into Monday with 7 air-strikes against the same range of targets and a Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device (VBIED). In total the coalition carried out 35 air-strikes across Syria and Iraq in those two days. By comparison in the same period Saudi Arabia carried out some 240 air-strikes in Yemen.

In response to the fighting which continues as I write the ISF have dispatched two regiments of the Iraqi police, a battalion of special forces and two regiments the Popular Mobilisation Force (PMF) militia from Camp Speicher near Tikrit to reinforce the refinery. The deployment of troops from Camp Speicher serves to underline that the oil refinery at Baiji has always been part of the Tikrit offensive. With the ISF initially liberating Baiji from ISIL back in December 2014 troops moved south from there to Camp Speicher on the northern outskirts of Tikrit while another force moved north from Samarra. As such I wouldn't consider the Tikrit offensive to be at an end until the area surrounding Baiji, Tikrit and Kirkuk including the Hawija district is fully secured.

The failure to complete the Tikrit offensive though hasn't stopped the PMF pressing for the immediate start of a new offensive to liberate Anbar province particularly the cities of Ramadi and Fallujah. I should probably start by explaining that the ISF first launched an operation to liberate Ramadi and Fallujah back in September 2014 but that ground to a halt due a failure to co-ordinate with the US-led coalition.  

Since then ISF operations in the area have continued so it's more a case of the intensity of the operation periodically increasing and decreasing rather then stopping and then starting again. Although US President Obama is clearly still deeply committed to his "Dither Doctrine" this is no way to conduct a military operation that should have a clear start date, an achievable set of objectives and a clear end point. Unfortunately the PMF who as a militia are quite hot-headed and somewhat shambolic would rather rush in straight away. This is perhaps understandable because in the roughly a year since ISIL first swept into Iraq they have been subjected to some extreme provocation. 

Not only have the Shia tribes that make up the PMF had to suffer the indignity of having large sections of their country over-run ISIL has made no secret of the fact that it wants to slaughter of Iraq's Shias. Since ISIL put themselves of the outskirts of the capital Baghdad in June 2014 they have been making good on that threat with wave after wave of suicide and car bomb attacks which have killed hundreds of Shia civilians. In January it seemed that the main ISIL cell within the capital had been broken up and arrested but in recent weeks a new cell has begun to emerge. For the most part this new cell has been largely ineffective injuring a few civilians rather then causing mass casualties. However with a wave of six bombings across Baghdad that killed 15 and wounded 90 it appears that the new cell is becoming more effective and more deadly.

However the PMF's very public calls for an Anbar offensive have prompted ISIL to launch a pre-emptive Anbar offensive of their own which so far has centred around Ramadi. As with the cities of Hasakah and Aleppo in Syria the situation in Ramadi has been something of a strange one. As part of the September operation the ISF did succeed in securing around 70% of Ramadi but were unable to fully dislodge ISIL from positions in the south of city. As part of their fresh offensive in the city ISIL have over the past week or so forced the ISF back in the north of the city and capturing villages on the northern outskirts. Today ISIL have succeeded in seizing control of several areas in the east of Ramadi leaving the ISF in only really in control of areas in west of the city.

This of course puts the ISF in a position where before they can put mount an operation to liberate Ramadi they first have to mount a defensive operation to stop ISIL gaining control of the city. Alternatively they might decide to abandon Ramadi entirely and then try to recapture it all at once as they did in Tikrit.

16:15 on 15/4/15 (UK date).