An interesting game of weapons exchange is being played out across these days. Weapons are stolen, taken from the dead, confiscated from the wounded, and even, in the oddest example, delivered by international allies.
On its brutal advances into Mosul, Tikrit, Kirkuk and Ramadi, the Islamic State group, or ISIS, has been able to seize loads of military equipment when the Iraqi army fled, leaving their gear behind.
After capturing a number of bases of the Iraqi Army, ISIS could take even more equipment. Everything, from guns, mortars and rockets to tanks, Humvees and other army vehicles has fallen into the hands of the extremists.
Some of the supplies and weapons were transferred to Syria, to help in the battle against other rebel groups. Much of it stayed in Iraq, however, and was used against the Kurdish Peshmerga and the Iraqi Army.
One of the reasons behind the recent defeat of the Iraqi army in Ramadi, was that Iraqi forces were out-gunned by weapons that were once their own.
Weapons that were made in the United States and Russia, many of them delivered to the Iraqi Army by Americans trainers.
The changing of hands of these weapons has had and will have a consequence for the battle. By empowering ISIS, the war will last longer.
The weapons add to the fear the Iraqi Army feels towards ISIS, as well as adding to the hardship of the Peshmerga and Sunni militias, both of which fighting with relatively light weapons.
In the past months, ISIS seemed to have lost much of its captured Iraqi weapons in bombing raids by the coalition forces. But it regained important tanks and Humvees in Ramadi, tipping the military balance back into its favor.
More US bombings are needed to destroy the mainly American weapons the group has again been able to amass.
The planes will have to bomb still more ISIS Humvees and vehicles filled with explosives to prevent them reaching the Kurdish and Iraqi fighters – and for the balance to tip once again into the direction of the Kurds and the Iraqi army.
ISIS tries to hide its loot, storing it in civilian areas and in houses left behind by its adversaries or fleeing Christians. Recently, the bombing of such a house in Mosul resulted in a number of human casualties.
The group uses explosives for suicide bombers and car bombs, but also for booby trapping any place its fighters are forced the leave behind when they withdraw.
At the same time, piles of guns and other weapons are gained by the Peshmerga in its battles against ISIS. Islamic State fighters, apparently choosing paradise, leave them behind when they go.
At the other side of the battle, even more guns and ammunition were seen piled up by Anbar tribes who were forced to submit them to ISIS after it captured Ramadi.
So weapons are circulating in Iraq: bought or given by Western nations, captured by ISIS and used against Iraqi forces, or being destroyed by US air raids. Billions of dollars are being lost this way.
The weapons industry must be extremely happy with this development. The US has already delivered weapons worth billions of dollars to Iraq, and promised immediately after the fall of Ramadi to send more. This included some 2,000 special anti-tank rockets meant to be used against the very US-supplied tanks ISIS was able to capture from the fleeing Iraqi Army.
Arms giant Russia has also promised to give Baghdad military aid.
At the same time, ISIS also possesses weapons provided to them by persons and authorities in different Gulf States. Any ideas about prohibiting these kinds of sales – even if it were possible – seem pointless as ISIS is so easily acquiring ever more weapons during battle.
Victories earn ISIS new recruits and strengthens the resolve of its fighters. If you look at the damage inflicted by the fighting and at the human loss, it is clear that the only other winner of the ISIS-war in Iraq and Syria is the international weapon industry.
If weapons do keep streaming in, and inevitably changing hands, the fighting will continue to rage. After almost a year of brutal battles, ISIS does not look any nearer to defeat – and especially not due to a lack of weapons.
Comments
Rudaw moderates all comments submitted on our website. We welcome comments which are relevant to the article and encourage further discussion about the issues that matter to you. We also welcome constructive criticism about Rudaw.
To be approved for publication, however, your comments must meet our community guidelines.
We will not tolerate the following: profanity, threats, personal attacks, vulgarity, abuse (such as sexism, racism, homophobia or xenophobia), or commercial or personal promotion.
Comments that do not meet our guidelines will be rejected. Comments are not edited – they are either approved or rejected.
Post a comment