Ninawa campaign

Ninawa campaign
Part of the Iraq War, (Operation Phantom Phoenix)
Date January 23–July 28, 2008 Location Ninawa Governorate, Iraq Result Indecisive Insurgents manage to maintain a significant presence in Mosul and surrounding areas and make the region their last urban stronghold Insurgents are largely isolated from the rest of the country and not able to conduct coordinated attacks outside of Ninawa .
Belligerents
United States Iraq	Iraqi insurgency al-Qaeda in Iraq
Commanders and leaders
Maj. Gen. Mark Hertling (MND-North) Maj. Gen. Riyadh Jalal Tawfiq (Ninawa Operational Command) Brig. Gen. Moutaa Habeeb Jassim (2nd IA Division) Maj. Gen. Wathiq Mohammed Abdul-Qadir hamdani (Iraqi Police) Brig. Gen. Salih Mohammed Hasan† (Iraqi Police)	Abu Yasir Jarullah (AQI field commander, killed) † Abd-al-Rahman Ibrahim Jasim Tha’ir (POW) (AQI Mosul commander, captured) Ab Abdul Khaleq al Sabaawi (POW) (Mosul leader, fled and was captured) Abu Mansour Ahmed Ali (second-in-command, killed) hajji hamdani (antiaircraft commander, killed) Nawaf Lutfi Jarrah (Ansar-ul-Sunnah commander, captured)
Casualties and losses
United States Army: 17 killed Iraqi Security Forces: 289 killed 2 captured Awakening Councils: 31 killed	224 killed 1,480 captured
548 civilians killed

Indecisive

Abu Yasir Jarullah (AQI field commander, killed) †
Abd-al-Rahman Ibrahim Jasim Tha’ir (POW) (AQI Mosul commander, captured) Ab
Abdul Khaleq al Sabaawi (POW) (Mosul leader, fled and was captured)

Abu Mansour Ahmed Ali (second-in-command, killed)

hajji hamdani (antiaircraft commander, killed)

The Ninawa campaign was a series of offensives and counter-attacks between insurgent and Coalition forces for control of the Ninawa Governorate in northern Iraq in early-to-mid-2008. Some fighting also occurred in the neighboring Kirkuk Governorate.

The capital of Ninawa province, Mosul, forms the northern tip of the "Sunni Triangle" and lies on a sectarian fault line between Sunni Arabs and Kurds. Before the Iraq War, it was a Ba'ath party stronghold and a major source of officers for the Iraqi Army. The U.S. 4th Infantry Division was originally tasked with entering northern Iraq through Turkey, however the Turkish government blocked the attempt. Instead, 2,000 paratroopers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade and 1000 U.S. Special Forces soldiers from the 10th Special Forces group opened a smaller front from Kurdistan, working with the Kurdish Peshmerga to secure Kirkuk and Mosul. As a result, the U.S. forces did not have a large military presence in Ninawa following the collapse of the Saddam Hussein regime. In early April 2003, the 173rd Airborne launched Operation Option North to secure Kirkuk and its nearby oilfields. Meanwhile, U.S. Special Forces and Peshmerga turned towards Mosul, securing the city on April 11 after the Iraqi Army V Corps surrendered. Despite efforts by the Special Forces commander, Lt. Col. Waltemeyer to keep Kurdish forces out of the city, Mosul fell into chaos with armed Kurds looting the city and forcing Arabs out of homes. At the same time, former Ba'athists and Iraqi military personnel fled south to Tikrit and began to form the insurgency. By the end of the first week of American occupation of Mosul, 31 Iraqis had been killed and 150 wounded.

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Wikipedia