Irag to launch new offensive in Diyala

Reuters:

Iraqi security forces are poised to launch a major crackdown in volatile Diyala province, the Interior Ministry said on Sunday, the latest in a series of operations aimed at stabilizing the country.

Sunni Islamist al Qaeda has sought to stoke tensions in the religiously and ethnically mixed northeastern province, which has seen a string of suicide bombings in recent months.

The crackdown will be the latest Iraqi-led offensive aimed at stamping government authority on areas once in the hands of Sunni Arab insurgents or Shi'ite militias.

U.S. and Iraqi officials say a campaign against al Qaeda in the northern city of Mosul and surrounding Nineveh province has helped reduce violence there. Other operations have targeted Shi'ite militias in the southern provinces of Basra and Maysan.

"Soon, the security forces will be in Diyala to play the role they played in Basra and Maysan and Mosul, and Diyala could be the last stage," Iraqi Interior Ministry spokesman Major-General Abdul-Kareem Khalaf told a news conference.

He did not give a date for the start of the Diyala crackdown and it was unclear if he meant the offensive would be the last major operation aimed at securing the country.

Overall attacks across Iraq were down 85 percent in June from a year ago, the Iraqi military said last week.

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The Iraqi army tends to announce offensives to give the enemy time to retreat. It is not as crazy as it might sound. For example, their offensive in Sadr City was almost a bloodless operation which led to the finding of numerous weapons caches as well as wanted Mahdi militiamen. In Mosul it was a little different because they put a cordon around the city to capture those trying to escape.

Diyala is where many of the insurgents fled after leaving Baghdad at the time the surge began. As the original clearing operation their took hold some of the al Qaeda ops fled to Mosul, but some have remained and those are the targets of the new operation. I think Diyala is also on the Iranian special groups rat lines.

The operational tempo of the Iraqi army in the last three months has been exceptional. It helps that they are not meeting much resistance, but hat is also evidence of the effectiveness of the surge operation.