March 3, 2015
By SINAN SALAHEDDIN and SAMEER N. YACOUB, Associated Press
BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraqi troops and Shiite militias battled the
Islamic State group on Tuesday on the outskirts of militant-held
Tikrit, unable to advance further on Saddam Hussein's hometown
as roadside mines and suicide attacks slowed their progress.
Soldiers found some 100 mines and bombs scattered along an
8-kilometer (5-mile) stretch of road on the way to this
strategic city on the Tigris River, Salahuddin deputy governor
Ammar Hikmat said.
The discovery underlined how the battle likely will pivot on
allied Iraqi forces' ability to counter such weapons, a mainstay
of al-Qaida in Iraq, the Islamic State group's predecessor, as
it fought American forces following their 2003 invasion of the
country.
The bombs are "the main obstacle in the way of the attacking
forces, which have to wait for bomb experts or to go around the
area," Hikmat told The Associated Press. "And this costs time."
Extremists from the Islamic State group, which holds both a
third of Iraq and neighboring Syria in its self-declared
caliphate, have littered major roadways and routes with mines.
Such mines allow the extremists to slow any ground advance and
require painstaking clearing operations before troops can safely
move through.
Suicide bombings also aid the militants in weakening Iraqi
forces and have been used extensively in its failed campaign for
the Syrian border town of Kobani. Already, a militant website
affiliated with the Islamic State group has said an American
jihadi carried out a suicide attack with a truck bomb on the
outskirts of the nearby city of Samarra, targeting Iraqi forces
and Shiite militiamen. The posting identified him by the nom de
guerre of Abu Dawoud al-Amriki, without elaborating.
A suicide bomber also drove a military vehicle Tuesday
afternoon into a checkpoint manned by government forces and
Shiite fighters south of Tikrit, killing four troops and
wounding 12, a police officer and a medical official said.
Tuesday marked the second day of the Iraqi advance on Tikrit,
with soldiers supported by Iranian-backed Shiite militias and
advisers, along with some Sunni tribal fighters who reject the
Islamic State group. Hikmat estimated the Iraqi force besieging
Tikrit at some 25,000 people. Iran's semi-official Fars news
agency has reported that Iranian Gen. Ghasem Soleimani, the
commander of the country's elite Revolutionary Guard's Quds
Force, was taking part in the offensive.
Government forces, however, made little headway Tuesday, two
local officials said. They said fierce clashes struck mainly
outside the town of al-Dour, south of Tikrit, while government
troops shelled militant bases inside the city. Those officials
spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to
brief journalists.
Brig. Gen. Saad Maan Ibrahim, an Interior Ministry spokesman,
said explosive experts had disabled "so many bombs and car
bombs."
"Tikrit has been besieged from three directions, from the
north, west and south, but what has remained only from the
eastern side," Ibrahim said. "The explosive experts were able to
tackle so many bombs and car bombs."
Hikmat said the offensive had killed and wounded "dozens" of
Islamic State extremists, but that the attacking forces also
have been killed. Authorities in Baghdad offered no immediate
casualty figures.
Past attempts to retake Tikrit have failed, as Iraq struggles
with a military that collapsed last summer during the Islamic
State militants' lightning offensive. The Tikrit operation is
seen as a litmus test for the capability of Iraqi troops to
dislodge the militants from major cities they conquered in the
country's Sunni heartland.
Retaking Tikrit, the provincial capital of Salahuddin
province, some 130 kilometers (80 miles) north of Baghdad, would
help Iraqi forces secure a major supply link for any future
operation to capture Mosul, the country's second-largest city.
U.S. military officials have said a coordinated military
mission to retake Mosul will likely begin in April or May and
involve up to 25,000 Iraqi troops. But the Americans have
cautioned that if the Iraqis aren't ready, the offensive could
be delayed.
On Monday, Iraqi and U.S. officials said the U.S.-led
coalition was not involved in the Tikrit operation and had not
been asked to carry out airstrikes. Overall, coalition
airstrikes have killed more than 8,500 Islamic State fighters
since its campaign began in August, said Army Gen. Lloyd Austin,
the commander of U.S. Central Command.
"The fact is that (the group) can no longer do what (it) did
at the outset, which is to seize and to hold new territory,"
Austin said.
As the Tikrit battle rages, Iraq remains bitterly split
between minority Sunnis, who were an important base of support
for Saddam, and the Shiite majority. Since Saddam was toppled
and later executed, the Sunni minority has felt increasingly
marginalized by the Shiite-led government in Baghdad. In 2006,
long-running tensions boiled over into sectarian violence that
claimed tens of thousands of lives.
The Islamic State group tapped into that Sunni resentment,
though Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, a Shiite, has offered an
amnesty for insurgents who abandon the extremists. His comments
appeared to be targeting former members of Iraq's outlawed Baath
party, loyalists of Saddam.
Later on Tuesday evening, a bomb exploded in a commercial
street in southeastern Baghdad, killing three people and
wounding nine, police and hospital officials said, speaking on
condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak
to the media.
___
Associated Press writers Maamoun Youssef and Jon Gambrell in
Cairo and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report.
___
Follow Sinan Salaheddin on Twitter at
www.twitter.com/sinansm.
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http://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2015/03/03/fierce-clashes-outside-iraqs-tikrit-after-new-offensive