WASHINGTON –
The significantly increased pressure that U.S.-led coalition
and local forces are putting on the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant’s
fighters is causing the terrorist group’s “caliphate” to unravel and crumble, a
senior Combined Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve official told
reporters today.
Via teleconference from Baghdad, British army Maj. Gen. Doug
Chalmers, deputy commander for strategy and sustainment, updated the Pentagon
reporters on the campaign to defeat ISIL.
Harnessing Coalition Power
Iraq security forces are making greater progress with
increased coalition-partner capability and capacity and by “harnessing the
power of the 65-nation international coalition,” Chalmers said.
Ramadi’s fall to ISIL fighters about a year ago became a
“high-water mark of the ISIL expansion,” Chalmers said. But since that time, he
added, “we’ve seen the tide turning on [ISIL]. Not only have their advances
been stopped, the terrain they have briefly controlled has been taken back by
the Iraqi security forces and by Syrian opposition.”
Chalmers said the coalition is striking ISIL on multiple fronts:
its fighters on the front lines and command and control operators, ISIL
leaders, its industrial base, financial systems, communication networks and its
system to bring foreign fighters in to fill ranks in both Iraq and Syria.
Enemy Faces Multi-Directional Fight
“We are forcing them to fight in multiple locations and in
multiple directions,” Chalmers said.
As coalition support accelerates, he said, airstrikes in
support of Iraqi ground advances continue to provide overwhelming combat power
“at the right time and place” on the battlefield, the general said.
Increased training for Iraqi police officers will add to the
existing 23,000 trained Iraqi forces, Chalmers said, adding that training also
will soon expand to the Iraq border security force.
“Not only will the Iraqi security forces be able to liberate
their territory,” he said. “They will be better-set to be able to hold it and
secure the population within it.”
Chalmers said the Iraqi forces’ increased confidence, as
they face ISIL fighters on the battlefield and defeat them, is likely the most
important factor in their increased success against the terrorist organization.
“The recent advances that they've made in both the Tigris
and Euphrates River Valleys at the same time … is deeply impressive,” he said.
“Not just in fighting terms, but also in sustainment terms.”
Counter-ISIL Fight Also Progresses in Syria
In Syria, the fight against ISIL is showing similar trends
in the face of efforts by partnered opposition forces, Chalmers said. “The
multiethnic components of the Syrian Democratic Forces are united against
[ISIL]. We've seen opposition forces in the northeast, near Mara, and in the
southeast … remain focused on defeating [ISIL] and removing its influence from
their homelands.”
The coalition advise-and-assist programs that support local
ground forces are proving to increase their effectiveness in combat, he added.
With ISIL wanting to mount attacks against the military
forces involved in the ongoing fight and against innocent civilian populations,
the fight ahead will continue to be challenging, Chalmers said, but he added
that the counter-ISIL campaign is progressing, and a defeat of ISIL in Iraq and
Syria is “inevitable.”
And because of the increased pressure on ISIL in both
countries, Chalmers said, operations “in Manbij, Fallujah and the Tigris River
Valley are shaping the battlefield and establishing the conditions for the two
big future fights: Raqqa and Mosul.”