Deaths in Kunduz; Iraq’s 9th Armored enters Mosul; Raqqa offensive now ‘months’ away; USS Zumwalt vs. China’s Type 055 destroyer; and just a bit more...
Trouble in Afghanistan: Two American servicemembers were killed and four others wounded after their partner forces in the Afghan commandos came under fire in northern Kunduz province Wednesday night, U.S. Forces-Afghanistan announced this morning in a statement. “The servicemembers were assisting Afghan commandos during a raid in the Buze Kandahari suburb of Kunduz city on Wednesday night when they came under insurgent fire,” the police spokesman for Kunduz province’s namesake district told Stars and Stripes.
There are “about 100 NATO advisers and an undisclosed number of other troops are assisting the Afghans” throughout Kunduz, which has seen some of the country’s more intense fighting for more than a year, Stripes adds.
The death of these two troops, whose names are withheld pending family notification, raises the toll to nine U.S. troops killed in “hostile fire” in Afghanistan this year; more than 2,200 have died there since 2001.
About Kunduz: “Kunduz district is one of 97 districts that are controlled or contested by the Taliban,” The Long War Journal recently reported in a longer look at the U.S. military’s assessment of Taliban control—which they say is “flawed.”
Why? “The US military says that the Taliban ‘influences’ at least 25 of Afghanistan’s 407 districts and controls only 8 more...A study by The Long War Journal estimates the Taliban controls 42 Afghan districts and contests (or influences) another 55...The number of Taliban controlled and influenced/contested districts has risen from 70 in October 2015 to 97 this month.” More on that, here.
Developing: The news from Kunduz could get worse after reports this morning more than 20 Afghan civilians were allegedly killed from either a U.S. or Afghan airstrike in the province, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Frud Bezhan reports.
Iraq’s 9th Armored Division becomes the second of Baghdad’s forces to enter Mosul, CNN reports: “Iraqi Ministry of Defense spokesman Brig. Gen. Tahsin Ibrahim told CNN that units of the 9th Armored Division had entered the city, adding that troops had stormed the neighborhood of al Intisar in the east…‘As forces broke through the city's border, the Iraqi Army opened up a safe route out for civilians to evacuate from the frontline in al Intisar,’” Ibrahim said.
Simultaneously, Iraqi Shi’ite Popular Mobilization Units say they’ve cut the western supply road from Mosul en route to the ISIS-held northern city of Tal Afar.
“Today, God willing, is the completion of the first stage of the Hashid (Popular Mobilisation) operations — that is cutting the supply route of the enemy between Tal Afar and the Muhalabiya district, reaching to Mosul,” Hadi al-Amiri, the leader of the Badr Organisation said, according to Reuters.
The PMUs have reported ongoing clashes and advances toward Tal Afar throughout the morning, here.
ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi speaks. And he has some marching orders: Stand tall against those who are fighting the coalition; and to those who wish to join the fight, go to Libya instead.
That’s the short take from a 30-minute speech released last night in which he managed to not once mention the city of Mosul directly, terrorism analyst Charlie Winter noted. Impossible to say for sure, but given other indicators from his message—noting the death of the group’s top PR man, Abu Mohammad al-Adnani (killed August 30) and information minister Abu Mohamed al-Furqan (killed October 11)—its earliest recorded date is probably October 12, The New York Times’ Rukmini Callimachi wrote. And that could be an indication of desperation, she added: “Not mentioning Mosul at this critical time invites so many questions. Surely ISIS isn’t blind to that, and decided to publish anyway.”
As well, al-Baghdadi called on the jihadists to “wreak havoc,” Reuters reports. “He also urged them to target Turkey and Saudi Arabia, Sunni Muslim regional powers he said had entered the war against Islamic State.”
Back to the Mosul offensive: It looks as though a Sunni militia has become the first alleged human rights violator of the operations, Amnesty International reported Wednesday. Residents of a cluster of villages south of Mosul in an area called Qati’ al-Sab’awiin reported fighters from the Sab’awi tribe rounded up men and boys, putting some in chicken cages, beating others with rods and hoses, and more. Details here.
From Defense One
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Welcome to Thursday’s edition of The D Brief by Ben Watson and Bradley Peniston. Thirty years ago today, the Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa published the news that the Reagan administration had sent weapons to Iran to secure the release of American hostages in Lebanon. (Send your friends this link: http://get.defenseone.com/d-brief/. And let us know your news: the-d-brief@defenseone.com.)
In Syria, the U.S. military says it killed a prominent al-Qaeda figure in the far northwest. The culprit: “Haydar Kirkan, an al Qaeda veteran who was trained in Afghanistan during the 1990s, was killed in an airstrike in Idlib, Syria on Oct. 17,” LWJ reported Wednesday. “US intelligence officials concluded that Kirkan was planning attacks against the West.”
Important point to note, according to LWJ: “The airstrike targeting Kirkan indicates that the US thinks that al Qaeda is still plotting against the West from Syrian soil. In the past, [AQ leader]Ayman al Zawahiri issued a stand down order on this front. While Zawahiri wanted the Khorasan Group and affiliated al Qaeda members to prepare attacks against the West, he did not give them the go ahead to actually launch the offensives. However, that calculation could change at any time.”
Line of the day (decade?): “Al-Qaida doesn’t recognize borders when they conspire to commit terrorist attacks against the West, and we will continue to work with our partners and allies to find and destroy their leaders, their fighters and their cells that are planning attacks externally,” Pentagon spox Capt. Jeff Davis said in a brief, but longer look at recent U.S. airstrikes across three countries (Yemen, Afghanistan and Syria) targeting AQ.
In case you were curious: Contrary to what Defense Secretary Ash Carter recently said, an attack on ISIS’s HQs in Raqqa is probably not mere “weeks away,” but more likely “six months off,” The Daily Beast’s Nancy Youssef reports.
Quotable: “Weeks?!” one commander said when he first heard this. “I’ve never heard anyone say that.”
The hold-up: “The local forces needed have not all been identified, their roles have yet to be defined, the weapons and training have yet to be allocated, and the so-called Islamic State has yet to be cut off from supply lines and foreign fighter flows that allow it to build up its defensive measures,” Youssef writes. More here.
Here’s one take on future U.S. strategy in Syria: You don’t need a No-Fly Zone to pressure Russia in the battlespace, writes Steven Heydemann, professor of Middle East studies at Smith College and a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Center for Middle East Policy, writing in The New York Times.
His plan involves creating a new political center of gravity in Syria: "The best candidate for recognition is the little-known Syrian Interim Government, or S.I.G. Unlike many other opposition groups, which are based in Turkey, the S.I.G. is based inside Syria, with offices in Idlib and scattered throughout opposition-held territory. Its prime minister, a politically independent heart surgeon named Jawad Abu Hatab, was elected in May by a large majority of the General Assembly of the National Coalition of Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, an important opposition group in exile." More on all that, here.
Russia has been quietly testing Nordic responses to various provocations. “In recent months, Russian fighter jets violated the airspace of Western nations, Moscow has turned a blind eye as thousands of refugees from countries along its southern border use Russian territory to cross into Europe, and the former superpower has deployed missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads to areas that pose that a direct threat to NATO countries,” US News reports.
None of this is particularly alarming, but it reflects tensions that have been growing for several years now. ICYMI, here’s a rundown on what the U.S. has been doing about it: Washington is Quietly Reinforcing Europe’s Northern Flank.
Further south, the United States is helping Ukraine rebuild its navy, which was largely lost when Russia seized Crimea, Reuters reports. Kiev’s flagship frigate and a pair of gunboats are being refitting with the help of a $30 million chunk of what is expected to be a $500 million U.S. aid package.
From February: A chart of Ukraine’s Navy.
China would like you to know its CH-5 drone is better than the MQ-9 in almost every category. That from Beijing’s Global Times, here.
Also, War Is Boring compares U.S. and Chinese 14-ton warships, the USS Zumwalt and the Type 055: “The Type 055 likely won’t be a direct competitor of Zumwalt,” writes David Axe. “Rather than integrating Zumwalt and her two sisters into carrier battle groups, the U.S. Navy will probably deploy the giant destroyers on solo cruises near land in order to take advantage of the vessels’ radar-evading hull-form and their twin, 155-millimeter guns, which can fire projectiles a distance of at least 80 miles in order to support amphibious landings and special operations.”
More on weapons: “The Type 055 reportedly boasts 128 vertical launch cells for anti-air missiles and other munitions — six cells more than the U.S. Navy’s own most heavily-armed surface warships, the venerable Ticonderoga-class cruisers. Zumwalt carries just 80 cells. These are arrayed along the edges of Zumwalt’s hull — the idea being that missile cells can also function as ‘armor,’ partially absorbing the force of a missile or gun hit.”
Axe’s bottom line: “The Type 055 will probably do for China what the Aegis cruisers and destroyers — nearly 100 of them — are already doing for the United States. That is, protecting the carriers. Zumwalt, however, could make near-shore fire support possible again — a feat the Type 055 surely can’t duplicate.” Read the rest, here.
The U.S. Army is taking bids on a new landing ship, Defense News reported Wednesday: “The service issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) to industry on Oct. 28 for a roughly 100-foot-long craft able to land an Abrams main battle tank directly onto a beach.”
A little history: “The new Maneuver Support Vessel (Light), or MSV(L), will replace dozens of Mike boats, a classic design that grew out of World War II’s emphasis on amphibious assault. Officially known as the Landing Craft Mechanized 8 Mod I or Mod II (LCM-8), the craft are used by the Army in myriad roles to move people and equipment around harbors and unimproved shores.”
New capabilities: “The MSV(L) will be bigger and faster than the old Mike boats. Army specifications call for a craft about 100 feet long, about 30 feet wide, drawing less than four feet, able to hit a top speed of at least 18 knots and travel 360 miles.” More here.
And lastly today: The U.S. Army is testing a new and seemingly very efficient door-breaching grenade, Military.com reported Monday. Not much more than a few pictures of Chemring’s 40mm door-breaching grenade to sift through on that one, though. But you can see the damage for yourself, here.