US Could Send 500 More Troops to Iraq Ahead of Operation to Retake Mosul

09/22/2016
The United States could send 500 more servicemen to Iraq, increasing the official numbers of American personnel in that country from 4,400 to 4,900.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) – The United States could send 500 more servicemen to Iraq, increasing the official numbers of American personnel in that country from 4,400 to 4,900 ahead of an operation to liberate the city of Mosul, The Wall Street Journal reports.
If the White House approves the deployment, the servicemen will be assigned to an area south of the Iraqi city of Mosul that US-led coalition forces prepare to retake from the Islamic State (Daesh) terrorists, the newspaper said on Wednesday citing US officials. The operation to retake Mosul is expected to start in mid-October, according to the officials. The Islamic State (ISIL, also known as Daesh), a designated terrorist organization that is outlawed in Russia and the United States, captured Mosul in 2014, along with a number of other northern and western Iraqi settlements. On Tuesday, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Abadi announced that the Iraqi Armed Forces had launched an offensive to liberate Shirqa, a town located south of Mosul and occupied by Daesh. On Monday, Abadi and US President Barack Obama held a meeting in New York, where they discussed a number of issues, including the anti-Daesh campaign and the operation to liberate the Daesh stronghold of Mosul.

Read more: https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/2...raq-mosul.html


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