Battle for Mosul IV

Michael Yon has another nonpareil post up, this one entitled Battle for Mosul IV.

It is a lengthy piece, and if you pay attention, you will see cause for hope in Iraq. And as always, you will see reason to admire and respect our tremendous military.

Yon spends a great deal of his post talking about something I've been talking about here as well, the increasing capability of the Iraqi security forces. Yon begins by comparing the chaos in Mosul some months ago to the initial chaos in New Orleans after the hurricane.

Mosul’s white chickens were in for an abrupt shift in theirs. The city became a headquarters for kidnappers and beheading squads whose video calling cards became a gruesome striptease on the nightly news. The growing influence of the increasingly brash insurgents and foreign fighters wasn’t lost on the locals, who paid a high price for resistance. More than two hundred Mosulite bodies—many headless—were tossed out in the streets.

When the storm hit Mosul, the destruction was catastrophic. Katrina’s winds and water may have destroyed the property of New Orleans, but not the idea of New Orleans. By contrast, while the real estate in Mosul remained relatively untouched, the very fabric of the society had been ripped open.

As I wrote about here, it takes professional skill to deal with this kind of situation. Yon acknowledges this:

Our soldiers faced a complex, rugged and courageous adversary, and one which could be exquisitely brutal, at a time when enemy morale was extremely high. Propaganda wouldn’t be enough. Being tougher, smarter and more adaptable was our only chance of winning the battle for Mosul without simultaneously flattening the city.

It was tough slogging to get this situation under control:

Month after month, the attacks continued, in combat that consumed tons of enemy ammunition and cost hundreds of enemy casualties. Stryker vehicles limped back to base, engines smoking, dragging tattered metal armor; mechanics worked twenty-four-hour days to keep Deuce Four in the fight. But the casualties extended beyond combatants and their damaged equipment. The local population, which had been friendly before, would no longer talk with the Americans, apparently fearful the enemy might either win or just outlast the Coalition. Both prospects terrified citizens into silence, and the Coalition’s best source of information fell mute. As it was for those storm-shocked people in New Orleans waiting on rooftops to be rescued, patience seemed a lot to ask from anyone in Mosul while bombs were exploding day and night.

And yet, the tide began to turn. As I've written about (see here, here, here, here, and here) too, Yon takes care to point out the much improved capability of the Iraqi forces. Here are some excerpts:

But that day, something was very different. I was actually witnessing Iraqi commanders aggressively deploying their own men, isolating the enemy.
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The policemen were not using the machine guns as tools to retreat, but were pushing out into blocking positions while their buddies cleared forward, and other Iraqi elements were isolating the shooters. It couldn’t be any clearer: a new sheriff was in town.
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Amazingly, these Iraqis continue to load up in those little trucks and go to work, knowing the odds are that they will, sooner or later, get shot or blown up. In a previous dispatch I stated that the only true martyrs I've seen in Iraq are these men, ordinary in most respects, who step forward and put everything on the line, for the idea of Iraq. But they also have a powerful example to follow now: one that gives them the courage to face these odds. In West Mosul every one of their leaders has been wounded in combat, some more than once, but they get right back into the fight—taking up positions in front.
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Despite losing members of their ranks to violent attacks practically every day, Iraqi police fought back, only getting stronger in the process. Following the lead of the American soldiers who re-captured the police stations, Iraqi cops were again living in their own stations.
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The police were also developing their own intelligence and acting on it, even becoming adept at “the cascading raid,” as I began to call it.
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But the new cops were cut from stronger cloth, and similar to how those American troops who see a lot of combat in Iraq seem to have the highest morale, the increased targeting of the Iraqi Police fostered greater unity among them and elevated their status. The increasing competence of the police department in Mosul was pinching the insurgents.
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[Iraqi Colonel] Noradeen’s current office was safe from giant bombs, but he wanted to move his office to Yarmook traffic circle—where shootouts and car bombs are guaranteed. Designing the outpost to withstand multiple simultaneous car bombs or giant truck bombs would require some thinking. When one of the American officers had asked Colonel Noradeen, "Why do you want an office at Yarmook Traffic Circle?" he answered simply, "If I build it there, they will come to me."

There's so much more there. Don't miss the section about the brutality to children, and the success at killing or capturing terrorists.

(linked to Mudville Gazette's Open Post)
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Others linking to Yon's post are Sister Toldjah, Blackfive, Lone Star Times, Stryker Brigade News, Swanky Conservative, SoCalPundit, 44 South Street, Dean's World