Who’s Who in Mosul: A guide to the most important battle in the fight against ISIS
The PMF have vowed to ignite a sectarian war if Turkey does not withdraw. “The invaders have not been welcomed by the Iraqi government,” PMF spokesperson Yousif al-Kilabi warned. “Therefore, if they insist on staying in Iraq we will treat them as enemies. We fight them the same way we fight ISIS.” Furthermore, the Badr Organization — one of the more prominent PMFs — stated that they “advise Erdogan to come to his senses and withdraw his soldiers before we send them back home in boxes.”
The Turks also have another concern regarding Mosul — the involvement of the Turkish Kurds.
The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), the Kurdish armed group that Turkey and Western allies consider a terrorist organization, has more than 5,000 fighters and clearly aims to be part of the Mosul liberation process. This is demonstrated by the Sinjar Resistance Unit, a PKK creation consisting mainly of Yazidi fighters. Its military commander, Haval Mazloum, has declared that “it is already decided that we would participate in liberating Mosul.” It is highly unlikely that the PKK will play a significant role in the battle, but their objective is more symbolic. The PKK’s ultimate goal is to be recognized as a force on the ground, legitimizing its efforts and presence with the international community. This plan is working. The Iraqi government has welcomed the PKK, and even went so far as pushing for representative offices to be opened in the country.
Meanwhile, the Turks are allied with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), a semi-autonomous government in northern Iraq led by President Massoud Barzani. Barzani supports the Turkish intervention as insurance against the PMF trying to seize upon the Mosul campaign to push the KRG from the area. There are about 40,000 KRG Peshmerga fighters involved in the campaign. As Barzani’s son Masrour explained to Sky News, “We are not extending the territories; we’re just regaining what was originally ours. All the areas the Peshmerga are controlling we believe is part of Kurdistan and there’s no reason for the Peshmerga to leave those areas.”
The Kurdish Peshmerga forces have so far liberated roughly thirty villages around Mosul. It is unlikely that Kurds will be willing to have sacrificed their Peshmerga forces without gaining anything permanent in return. Since the KRG is taking the lead in this operation, they will expect to take the lead in administrating Mosul after the fall of ISIS — though splits between the KRG’s political parties may create further complications.
Finally, there are the Iraqi Christians, who plan to play a significant role in the battle for Mosul. The Christians, along with the Yazidis, were victims of ISIS, which forced hundreds of thousands of religious minorities to flee in 2014. Now, an estimated 1,500 Christian fighters, including the Babylon Brigade, are ready to take arms against ISIS.
To take back Mosul, all of these forces will have to coordinate and cooperate. Based on their diverse, and sometimes conflicting interests, this may get complicated. The stakes are high, both for the future of Iraq, and for the international community.
Diliman Abdulkader is a Research Associate at the Endowment for Middle East Truth (EMET); Adam Turner is EMET’s General Counsel. For more on this subject, read Seth J. Frantzman’s recent dispatch from Mosul.
This article is published courtesy of The Tower
