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Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Monday he believes U.S. forces will be in Iraq and in the fight against Islamic State militants for a while, despite some rocky times between the two nations.

Speaking at the end of a day of meetings in Baghdad with military commanders and Iraqi political leaders, Mattis said he is open to any request from his military commanders to aid the battle to retake Mosul and launch a major battle to oust IS from the base of its so-called caliphate in Raqqa, Syria. He would not provide details.

Despite President Donald Trump's past threats to take Iraq's oil and his attempt to impose a travel ban that includes Iraqi citizens, Mattis said his meetings with Iraqi leaders underscored the partnership the U.S. has with the Iraqis.

He said there's no doubt that "the Iraqi people, the Iraqi military and the Iraqi political leadership recognize what they're up against and the value of the coalition and the partnership, in particular with the United States."

His optimistic words come on the heels of his earlier declaration that the U.S. does not intend to seize Iraqi oil, distancing himself from comments made by President Donald Trump that has rattled Iraq's leaders.

Trump's oil threat and his inclusion of Iraq in the administration's travel ban have roiled the nation and spurred local lawmakers to pressure al-Abadi to reduce cooperation with Washington.

"I think all of us here in this room, all of us in America have generally paid for our gas and oil all along, and I'm sure that we will continue to do that in the future," Mattis told reporters traveling with him. "We're not in Iraq to seize anybody's oil."

Trump brought up the prospect during the campaign, and he mentioned it again late last month during a visit to the CIA. He told the gathering there that, "To the victor belong the spoils," and added, "maybe you'll have another chance" to take the oil.

Despite those tensions, Mattis and Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, described an enduring partnership between the U.S. and Iraq.

"I imagine we'll be in this fight for a while and we'll stand by each other," Mattis said.

Townsend, who was standing by Mattis, declined to say how long the U.S. will stay in Iraq. But, he said, "I don't anticipate that we'll be asked to leave by the government of Iraq immediately after Mosul." He added, "I think that the government of Iraq realizes their very complex fight, and they're going to need the assistance of the coalition even beyond Mosul."

Townsend also acknowledged that U.S. forces are now operating closer and deeper into the fight with Iraq units as the battle to retake western Mosul entered its second day.

He said the change began in recent months during the successful fight to take back eastern Mosul, and is now happening more often. U.S. special operations forces have been working with the Iraqis, offering advice and assistance but initially they were only at the headquarters' level.

More recently they have been moving closer to the battlefront, working with brigade, battalion and sometimes smaller units. But they are generally with command and control units, not in combat on the front lines.

"We embedded advisers a bit further down into the formation," Townsend said.

Mattis' unannounced one-day stop in Iraq was his first as Pentagon chief and the first visit to the warzone by a senior member of the Trump administration. It comes as Mattis and his military leaders are nearing the end of a 30-day review of the Islamic State fight. He must send Trump a strategy to accelerate the battle in the next seven days.

Senior U.S. military officers said Monday that the fight in the more urban, heavily populated areas of western Mosul will require more precision airstrikes and probably smaller bombs that can take out a building or group of militants and leave surroundings intact.

Lt. Gen. Jeff Harrigian, the top Air Force commander in the Middle East, said troops responsible for calling in airstrikes are closer to the fight and can move forward with Iraqi units. They also have greater authority now to speak directly to pilots in the aircraft overhead, allowing them to launch strikes more quickly, he said.

Military leaders, said Harrigian, realized they could be more responsive now because the troops have built up trust with their Iraqi partners.

While Mattis and Townsend wouldn't talk about any future changes or accelerants in the war fight, various military options have been discussed in recent months. Among them: putting more troops in Iraq and Syria and boosting military aid to Kurdish fighters backed by the U.S.-led coalition.

More specifically, officials have talked about expanding efforts to train, advise and enable local Iraqi and Syrian forces, increasing intelligence and surveillance, and allowing U.S. troops to move forward more frequently with Iraqi soldiers nearer the front lines.

The Pentagon also would like more freedom to make daily decisions about how it fights the enemy. Current and former U.S. officials discussed the likely options on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to talk publicly.

In Syria, a possible option would be to send more U.S. forces, including combat troops, there as the Raqqa fight heats up.

Another move would be to provide heavy weapons and vehicles to the U.S.-backed Syrian Kurds, and boost training. They have been the most effective force against IS in northern and eastern Syria, but the proposal is sensitive. Turkey, a key U.S. and NATO ally, considers the group a terrorist organization.

There are more than 5,100 U.S. military personnel in Iraq, and up to about 500 in Syria.

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Defense Secretary Mattis: US will stay in Iraq a while - Chicago Tribune

BAGHDAD After three years of being told they could not go to the front lines, U.S. troops advising Iraqi forces as they evict ISIS from Mosul no longer face those tight restrictions, according to the top U.S. commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend, as the new defense secretary stood by his side in Baghdad.

"It is true that we are operating closer and deeper into the Iraqi formation," Townsend told reporters travelling with Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis. "We adjusted our posture during the east Mosul fight and embedded advisers a bit further down into the formation."

MATTIS REBUFFS RUSSIAN COOPERATION CALL

Townsend, who began his career in Baghdad as a Colonel leading a Struyker brigade during the surge in 2007, commands more than 6,000 U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria.

"I have all the authorities I need to prosecute our fight and I am confident that if I were to need more that my leadership would provide those," Townsend said.

Mattis, a former Marine four-star general who served several tours in Iraq, is on his first visit to Iraq in his new civilian role. He is tasked with presenting President Trump a new plan to defeat ISIS -- a plan due on Feb. 27. Mattis suggested the former restrictions could be further loosened as he weighs whether to send more troops, and the Coalition prepares to expand the fight to Raqqa, the ISIS capital in Syria.

"We owe some degree of confidentiality so we don't expose to the enemy what we have in mind as to the timing of operations," Mattis said.

Call it the Trump effect, but U.S. commanders began loosening the restrictions on forward deployed troops back in November as Iraqi forces pushed into Mosul, a tough fight that began in October and is now entering a second phase in western Mosul. When the U.S. military returned to Iraq three years ago, the Obama administration refused to say U.S. troops were in combat or refer to them as "boots on the ground." The White House refused to allow these "advisers" to go to the front lines.

On the campaign trail Trump said if he were commander in chief he would loosen the overly restrictive rules of engagement.

"I would knock the hell out of ISIS...[and] when you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families," Trump said on "Fox & Friends" in December 2015.

The western Mosul operation was launched by the Iraqi Prime Minister just one day before Mattis arrived in Baghdad, a move welcomed by U.S. commanders and the new defense secretary.

"The Iraqi army has fought very well, they've lost troops and kept fighting, they've been very brave," Mattis said while meeting Iraq's defense minister. "And I'm just here to tell the minister that I admire what his troops are continuing to do today in west Mosul."

Townsend added: "If you look back a little over two years ago, this army was broken and defeated, barely able to hold their capital. This army has done this remarkable turnaround in just two years. It is an incredible turn around. They've liberated half their lost territory. They are about to liberate their second largest city center held by ISIS. Iraqi security forces are going to take that city back. No doubt about it."

Asked whether he thought U.S. troops will be asked to leave Iraq after the military clears Mosul of ISIS fighters, the top U.S. commander and the defense secretary said U.S. troops will be in Iraq for some time.

"I don't anticipate that we'll be asked to leave by the government of Iraq after Mosul," Townsend said. "The government recognizes this is a complex fight. I wouldn't want to put a timeline on it."

Mattis added: "This is a partnership. There have been a lot of rocky times out here. I imagine we'll be in this fight for a while and we'll stand by each other."

Radical Shia cleric Moqtada Al Sadr has called for U.S. troops to leave Iraq in the wake of the White House's proposed travel ban temporarily halting visas for Iraqis and repeated threats from President Trump that he would have taken Iraqi oil to pay for the war, an idea Mattis squashed before landing in Baghdad.

Said Mattis: "We're not in Iraq to seize anyone's oil."

Jennifer Griffin currently serves as a national security correspondent for FOX News Channel . She joined FNC in October 1999 as a Jerusalem-based correspondent. You can follow her on Twitter at @JenGriffinFNC.

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US troops in Iraq operating closer to front lines - Fox News

SOUTHWEST ASIA, Feb. 20, 2017 U.S. and coalition military forces continued to attack the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria yesterday, Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve officials reported today.

Officials reported details of yesterdays strikes, noting that assessments of results are based on initial reports.

Strikes in Syria

Coalition military forces conducted 16 strikes consisting of 29 engagements against ISIS targets in Syria:

-- Near Bab, a strike engaged an ISIS tactical unit.

-- Near Shadaddi, three strikes engaged three ISIS tactical units and destroyed two fighting positions and a vehicle.

-- Near Raqqa, eight strikes engaged five ISIS tactical units and destroyed two ISIS headquarters, a vehicle, a command and control node, a vehicle bomb, a vehicle bomb facility, an artillery system, and a tunnel.

-- Near Dayr Az Zawr, three strikes destroyed seven oil wellheads.

-- Near Palmyra, a strike destroyed an anti-air artillery system.

Strikes in Iraq

Coalition military forces conducted 13 strikes consisting of 63 engagements in Iraq, coordinated with and in support of the Iraqi government:

-- Near Haditha, a strike destroyed five connexes.

-- Near Huwayjah, a strike engaged an ISIS tactical unit and destroyed a vehicle.

-- Near Mosul, six strikes engaged four ISIS tactical units and two ISIS staging areas; damaged 15 supply routes; suppressed nine mortar teams and an artillery team; and destroyed five mortar systems, four vehicles, three supply caches, three artillery systems, two command and control nodes, an ISIS headquarters, a bomb-making facility, a heavy machine gun, a logistics node and a fighting position.

-- Near Rawah, two strikes destroyed two vehicle bomb facilities and an ISIS-held building.

-- Near Taji, a strike engaged an ISIS tactical unit.

-- Near Tal Afar, two strikes engaged an ISIS tactical unit and destroyed an ISIS-held building and an excavator.

Task force officials define a strike as one or more kinetic events that occur in roughly the same geographic location to produce a single, sometimes cumulative, effect. Therefore, officials explained, a single aircraft delivering a single weapon against a lone ISIS vehicle is a strike, but so is multiple aircraft delivering dozens of weapons against buildings, vehicles and weapon systems in a compound, for example, having the cumulative effect of making those targets harder or impossible for ISIS to use.

Accordingly, officials said, they do not report the number or type of aircraft employed in a strike, the number of munitions dropped in each strike, or the number of individual munition impact points against a target. Ground-based artillery fired in counterfire or in fire support to maneuver roles is not classified as a strike.

Part of Operation Inherent Resolve

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Counter-ISIS Strikes Continue in Syria, Iraq - Department of Defense

UPDATED: MONDAY, FEB. 20, 2017, 12:29 P.M.

TEHRAN, Iran Iranian authorities on Monday blamed neighboring Iraq for a sandstorm that knocked out power in an oil-rich southern province and sparked protests against local officials.

Masoumeh Ebtekar, a vice president in charge of environmental affairs, called on Iraq to implement an agreement to prevent dust storms by spreading mulch over 3,500 sq. miles (9,000 sq. kilometers) of desert, state TV reported.

Iraqi officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

The sandstorm temporarily cut off power and water to much of the Khuzestan province, and reduced oil production by 700,000 barrels per day. The state-run IRNA news agency quoted a local health official as saying that 218 people were hospitalized for respiratory problems because of the storm.

Last week hundreds of Iranians protested in the city of Ahvaz, demanding the resignation of Ebtekar and the provincial governor. Authorities have since banned protests over the issue.

Irans Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Monday urged the government to take swift and explicit action to address the fallout from the dust storm.

Iran says the dust storms originate in Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria, and has urged authorities in those countries to combat the problem with irrigation projects and other measures.

See the article here:
Iran blames sandstorm on Iraq after protests over power cuts - The Spokesman-Review

Defense Secretary James N. Mattis made an unannounced visit to Iraqs capital on Monday to reassure allies of the U.S. militarys commitment to support the sprawling operation to recapturethe city of Mosul from entrenched Islamic State militants.

Ahead of the trip, however, Mattis made clear he did not advocate President Trumps oft-stated wish to take Iraqs oil.

Such anundertaking would beillegal and requiredecades of occupation byhundreds of thousands of troops, and likely cost more money than could be earned from the oil.

All of us in America have generally paid for our gas and oil all along and Im sure we will continue to do so in the future, Mattissaid. Were not in Iraq to seize anybodys oil.

Trump, as a candidate and as president, has repeatedly said that the U.S. should have taken Iraqs oil, including at CIA headquarters onjust one day after his inauguration last month.

"The old expression, 'to the victor belong the spoils' you remember," he said. I always used to say, 'Keep the oil.' I wasnt a fan of [the war in] Iraq. I didnt want to go into Iraq. But I will tell you, when we were in, we got out wrong....

If we kept the oil, you probably wouldnt have ISIS because thats where they made their money in the first place. So we should have kept the oil. But OK. Maybe youll have another chance. But the fact is, should have kept the oil, he said, using an acronym for Islamic State, themilitant group that seized oil fields in Iraq and Syria and sold their outputon the black market.

Iraq's economy is nearly entirely reliant on oil and it remains the lifeblood for Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Abadis fragile government as it triestoprovidebasic services to citizens and maintain the nationsaging infrastructure.

Legal experts have said the U.S. seizure of Iraqi oil would have violated decades of international law, including the Geneva Conventions.

When Mattis stepped off the C-17 cargo plane Monday morning, it marked his first return to the war-torn country where he spent years in combat as a Marine Corps officer before retiring as a four-star general in 2014.

Hes set to have face-to-face talks with Abadi and other senior Iraqi government officials, whom he called our partner in this fight against Islamic State. Iraqi ground forces began the assault Sunday to retake Mosul, Iraqs second-largest city.

The operation, backed by U.S. air power and special forces, is expected to take months.

Were going to make certain that we have good shared situational awareness of what we face as we work together, fight alongside each other to destroy ISIS, Mattis told reporters Sunday before the trip.

Iraq is also one of seven countries named in Trump's temporary ban on travelersthat was put on hold by the courts. Trump's ban caused anger in Iraq, where members of parliament considered retaliating by refusing to grantvisas for U.S. nationals.

While the Trump administration intends to issue another version of the ban, Mattis said he was promised that it would shield the thousands of Iraqi interpreters, advisorsand others who have assisted the American militaryin Iraq.

Right now, I am assured that we will take steps to allow those who have fought alongside us, for example, to be allowed in to the United States, Mattissaid. They will be vetted obviously by their performance on the battlefield beside us.

Originally posted here:
Defense Secretary Mattis arrives in Iraq and makes clear the US is not there to take oil - Los Angeles Times