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| Kurdish Peshmerga front line facing Iranian-led PMU southwest of Kirkuk |
UPDATE 18 October 2017: This is very likely the final update for this SITREP. In support of all that has been written here on this particular subject, I submit a Threat Matrix blog report by Bill Roggio of the very highly respected Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD) Long War Journal. I urge you to read the linked report for yourselves.
This report confirms what has been independently posted here in contradiction to the obvious politically-motivated statements made by CJTF-OIR spokespersons over the course of the past few days. Those statements clearly expressed the propaganda of the Shi'a-dominated Government of Iraq (GoI) in Baghdad and their terrorist Iranian overlords. These CJTF-OIR statements are diametrically opposed to what President Trump announced concerning Iran and the IRGC last week.
The glaringly obvious disconnect between the Commander-In-Chief in the White House and the U.S.-led CJTF-OIR HQ in Baghdad is extremely distressing. Since when does the United States provide political cover for the terrorist Ayatollah Khamenei of the Islamic Republic of Iran and his various Iranian and Iraqi sock puppets? These are the same Iranian terrorists responsible for the deaths and maiming of thousands of American troops during Operation Iraqi Freedom, and as recently reported here, continue to kill American troops serving in Iraq.
17 October 2017: Why is this SITREP important? Because Jesus said it would be important. Matthew 24:7 records our Lord saying "For ethnos shall rise against ethnos, and basileia against basileia ..." This prophecy precisely defines what is occurring across the world, but especially in the MidEast, and particularly in Iraq. In this battle of Iraq there are Kurds, Arabs, Turkmen, Persians ethnic groups. Within them there are Christian, Sunni, Yazidi and Shi'a religious groups; some fighting to conquer the other, some fighting for their very survival. The importance of this should be as self-evident as it is prophetic.
What led to the Kurdish defeat and retreat at Maktab Khalid junction, Tuz Khurmatu and Kirkuk? Within the militias that make up the Kurdish Peshmerga there are eastern Iraqi Kurds loyal to the family clan in Suleimaniya, and then there are those loyal to western Kurds of Erbil and Dohuk. The Kurds are, and have been in the past, a house divided.
The eastern Kurds were visited prior to shots being fired by IRGC Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani who issued his own ultimatum to the Kurdish PUK militia to stand down as his Shi'a Turkomen Hashd al-Shaabi militiamen advanced in state-of-the-art American M1 Abrams tanks and combat vehicles acquired from stocks given by the U.S. to the Iraqi government in Baghdad. So, the PUK abandoned their posts on the southern Kirkuk front leaving the YPG and other Kurdish militia exposed in indefensible positions in the center and western fronts around Kirkuk.
For it's part the U.S. did nothing except to plead for the Iraqi government and the Kurdish government in Erbil, both of whom are supposed to be U.S. allies with the CJTF-OIR, to dialog with each other and not fight. The offset here is that from the get-go back in 2014 when IS rampaged through Iraq the U.S. provided mechanized brigade equipment to the Kurdish Peshmerga while providing heavy armored division equipment to the Iraqi ISF. Hands-down the Kurds would be no match on a future battlefield against the forces of Iranian-dominated Iraqi government forces. The Shi'a government in Baghdad had no qualms about letting the IRGC Qods force terrorist share in the American military largesse of war-winning equipment.
The Kurds are natural allies to the West and America in particular. So too the Israeli's. However, the American government has yet to understand and foresee or to do anything constructive to halt Iranian penetration into what remains of Iraq. This issue is dealt with in detail (for those who pay attention to details) in a Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs January 2016 article entitled The Iranian Penetration of Iraqi Kurdistan. America has been more concerned about its failings in the Obama retreat of 2010 and ignored the Iranian threat to the whole of Iraq entirely. As a result the Kurds and (remnant) Assyrian Christians in Erbil and Dohuk are paying the price.
16 October 2017: Early this morning the Iranian-led PMUs initiated an all-out assault on the Kurdish defenders of Kirkuk.
The Eschatology Today assessment of the designed purpose of IRGC general Qassem Soleimani's gambit in Kirkuk appears to have at least two primary objectives:
1) To destroy the cohesion within the United States-led CJTF-OIR Coalition headquartered in Baghdad by forcing the Iraqi Army into battle against Iraqi Kurds. An Iraqi civil war in layman's terms which pits the two primary military forces within Iraq against each other.
2) To create a self-fulfilling prophetic condition which is a pillar of Shi'a Hojjatieh eschatology - a chaotic warfighting situation in Iraq which hastens the arrival of their mythical al-Mahdi figure. Of course Qassem Soleimani is well-positioned to inherit that coveted Shi'a mantle.
This gambit has the potential to backfire in a very big way, and that depends largely on how the United States and its allies as well as the State of Israel react to this fighting. How the Iraqi army itself reacts to fighting against the Kurds, many of whom are within its ranks, is also a critical potential to backfire. Sunni Arabs and Kurds being led into a war by scheming Shi'a is an extremely risky gambit for Iran to undertake.
Also overnight, the IAF attacked and almost certainly destroyed a Syrian SA-5 SAM site near Damascus. The potential for a full-scale three-ring circus of war in the Middle East may be in the offing, which is something most of us have been expecting for some time. More to come, obviously.
15 October 2017: Fighting has erupted between the Shi'a Popular Mobilization Unit (PMU) Hashd al-Shaabi militia and the Kurdish Peshmerga at a strategic junction south of Kirkuk known as Maktab Khalid. There are also confrontations which amount to Iranian ethnic cleansing of Kurdish families in Tuz Khurmatu, about 40 miles south of Kirkuk. The initial combat engagement at Tuz Khurmatu went on for at least five hours. Thus far Iraqi regular army units have not attacked the Kurds, but have their weapons pointed at them.
The Peshmerga have stood their ground in rejecting the PMU ultimatum to withdraw by midnight Baghdad time (9 PM in London, UK). The Peshmerga have been ordered to defend their hard won territory "at all costs." The Maktab Khalid junction controls access to a nearby airbase and oil production facilities south of Kirkuk.
This report confirms what has been independently posted here in contradiction to the obvious politically-motivated statements made by CJTF-OIR spokespersons over the course of the past few days. Those statements clearly expressed the propaganda of the Shi'a-dominated Government of Iraq (GoI) in Baghdad and their terrorist Iranian overlords. These CJTF-OIR statements are diametrically opposed to what President Trump announced concerning Iran and the IRGC last week.
The glaringly obvious disconnect between the Commander-In-Chief in the White House and the U.S.-led CJTF-OIR HQ in Baghdad is extremely distressing. Since when does the United States provide political cover for the terrorist Ayatollah Khamenei of the Islamic Republic of Iran and his various Iranian and Iraqi sock puppets? These are the same Iranian terrorists responsible for the deaths and maiming of thousands of American troops during Operation Iraqi Freedom, and as recently reported here, continue to kill American troops serving in Iraq.
17 October 2017: Why is this SITREP important? Because Jesus said it would be important. Matthew 24:7 records our Lord saying "For ethnos shall rise against ethnos, and basileia against basileia ..." This prophecy precisely defines what is occurring across the world, but especially in the MidEast, and particularly in Iraq. In this battle of Iraq there are Kurds, Arabs, Turkmen, Persians ethnic groups. Within them there are Christian, Sunni, Yazidi and Shi'a religious groups; some fighting to conquer the other, some fighting for their very survival. The importance of this should be as self-evident as it is prophetic.
What led to the Kurdish defeat and retreat at Maktab Khalid junction, Tuz Khurmatu and Kirkuk? Within the militias that make up the Kurdish Peshmerga there are eastern Iraqi Kurds loyal to the family clan in Suleimaniya, and then there are those loyal to western Kurds of Erbil and Dohuk. The Kurds are, and have been in the past, a house divided.
The eastern Kurds were visited prior to shots being fired by IRGC Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani who issued his own ultimatum to the Kurdish PUK militia to stand down as his Shi'a Turkomen Hashd al-Shaabi militiamen advanced in state-of-the-art American M1 Abrams tanks and combat vehicles acquired from stocks given by the U.S. to the Iraqi government in Baghdad. So, the PUK abandoned their posts on the southern Kirkuk front leaving the YPG and other Kurdish militia exposed in indefensible positions in the center and western fronts around Kirkuk.
For it's part the U.S. did nothing except to plead for the Iraqi government and the Kurdish government in Erbil, both of whom are supposed to be U.S. allies with the CJTF-OIR, to dialog with each other and not fight. The offset here is that from the get-go back in 2014 when IS rampaged through Iraq the U.S. provided mechanized brigade equipment to the Kurdish Peshmerga while providing heavy armored division equipment to the Iraqi ISF. Hands-down the Kurds would be no match on a future battlefield against the forces of Iranian-dominated Iraqi government forces. The Shi'a government in Baghdad had no qualms about letting the IRGC Qods force terrorist share in the American military largesse of war-winning equipment.
The Kurds are natural allies to the West and America in particular. So too the Israeli's. However, the American government has yet to understand and foresee or to do anything constructive to halt Iranian penetration into what remains of Iraq. This issue is dealt with in detail (for those who pay attention to details) in a Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs January 2016 article entitled The Iranian Penetration of Iraqi Kurdistan. America has been more concerned about its failings in the Obama retreat of 2010 and ignored the Iranian threat to the whole of Iraq entirely. As a result the Kurds and (remnant) Assyrian Christians in Erbil and Dohuk are paying the price.
16 October 2017: Early this morning the Iranian-led PMUs initiated an all-out assault on the Kurdish defenders of Kirkuk.
The Eschatology Today assessment of the designed purpose of IRGC general Qassem Soleimani's gambit in Kirkuk appears to have at least two primary objectives:
1) To destroy the cohesion within the United States-led CJTF-OIR Coalition headquartered in Baghdad by forcing the Iraqi Army into battle against Iraqi Kurds. An Iraqi civil war in layman's terms which pits the two primary military forces within Iraq against each other.
2) To create a self-fulfilling prophetic condition which is a pillar of Shi'a Hojjatieh eschatology - a chaotic warfighting situation in Iraq which hastens the arrival of their mythical al-Mahdi figure. Of course Qassem Soleimani is well-positioned to inherit that coveted Shi'a mantle.
This gambit has the potential to backfire in a very big way, and that depends largely on how the United States and its allies as well as the State of Israel react to this fighting. How the Iraqi army itself reacts to fighting against the Kurds, many of whom are within its ranks, is also a critical potential to backfire. Sunni Arabs and Kurds being led into a war by scheming Shi'a is an extremely risky gambit for Iran to undertake.
Also overnight, the IAF attacked and almost certainly destroyed a Syrian SA-5 SAM site near Damascus. The potential for a full-scale three-ring circus of war in the Middle East may be in the offing, which is something most of us have been expecting for some time. More to come, obviously.
15 October 2017: Fighting has erupted between the Shi'a Popular Mobilization Unit (PMU) Hashd al-Shaabi militia and the Kurdish Peshmerga at a strategic junction south of Kirkuk known as Maktab Khalid. There are also confrontations which amount to Iranian ethnic cleansing of Kurdish families in Tuz Khurmatu, about 40 miles south of Kirkuk. The initial combat engagement at Tuz Khurmatu went on for at least five hours. Thus far Iraqi regular army units have not attacked the Kurds, but have their weapons pointed at them.
The Peshmerga have stood their ground in rejecting the PMU ultimatum to withdraw by midnight Baghdad time (9 PM in London, UK). The Peshmerga have been ordered to defend their hard won territory "at all costs." The Maktab Khalid junction controls access to a nearby airbase and oil production facilities south of Kirkuk.
The PMU is a collection of Iraqi Shi'a militias which are under the direct control of IRGC Qods Force General Qassem Soleimani. The Peshmerga cites hard intelligence that IRGC officers and troops are embedded within the PMUs. These foreign-led troops are the only forces thus far to exhibit aggression against the Kurdish people.
The Peshmerga are the primary military force of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), and have been an integral component of the U.S.-led CJTF-OIR in the fight against the Islamic State. U.S. special forces are known to been embedded with Peshmerga and other Kurdish units. In the Kurdish language Peshmerga means "those who face death." They are obviously very highly-regarded Kurdish soldiers.
The Peshmerga are the primary military force of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), and have been an integral component of the U.S.-led CJTF-OIR in the fight against the Islamic State. U.S. special forces are known to been embedded with Peshmerga and other Kurdish units. In the Kurdish language Peshmerga means "those who face death." They are obviously very highly-regarded Kurdish soldiers.
Given President Trump's very recent casting of the IRGC as terrorists as part of his Iran Doctrine, it therefore follows that all IRGC-led militias would also fall under the terrorist categorization as well. The PMF attack on the Peshmerga could well be seen in the White House as an Iranian terrorist attack upon a component of CJTF-OIR. This is something that was predicted in SITREP D4-17 less than 48 hours ago.
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| General Geographic Area of Conflict |
More as developments occur...
