Kurdish arms dealers. Yahoo/Reuters
Kurdish Peshmerga fighters have taken control of the critical Mosul Dam. Yahoo/Reuters. Although some reports say the dam is contested, merely contesting the dam is a major strategic victory for Iraq. It was feared that ISIS could have shut down water supplies for the rest of the country or, even worse, opened the floodgates or destroy the dam causing an epic amount of flooding. The victory comes as hope that Kurds and Iraqis could form a more stable government.
My Comment:
Probably the first good news to come out of Iraq in a long time. This dam was beyond critical. Cutting of the water supplies for a large part of Iraq would have been devastating, but flooding the country would be worse. In a desert country like Iraq water is worth more then oil when it comes to fighting a war. And ISIS isn't above using water as a weapon. Hopefully the Peshmerga will be able to take back Mosul as well.
The article also talked about mission creep but from a British perspective. I don't know enough about British politics to comment on the report but from an American perspective this has gone beyond the original goal of preventing a genocide. I'm not upset about it because using water as a weapon of war doesn't sit right with me. It might be one of ISIS's lesser crimes but it's still evil, especially since it would largely hurt civilians. I don't really want U.S. troops to go back to Iraq but I don't really have a problem with killing ISIS terrorists either. Hopefully the Kurds and Iraqis can work together to fight ISIS without too much foreign help.
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