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Iraqi drive on Tikrit falters amid fierce Islamic State resistance

Poorly trained army unable to shake militants

The Columbian
Published: August 19, 2014, 5:00pm

IRBIL, Iraq — Iraqi forces pushed north Tuesday in an attempt to recapture the central Iraq town of Tikrit from the Islamic militants who have been occupying it since mid-June, only to see the assault stymied by snipers, roadside bombs and fierce resistance from the rebels.

By midday, the Iraq army units were bogged down at least six miles from the entrance to the city and appeared to be withdrawing south toward the government-held city of Samara, according to local residents and Kurdish security officials. In a statement to local television, the Iraqi Defense Ministry spokesman, Maj. Gen. Qassem Atta, said that the army had dismantled at least 40 roadside bombs but declined to elaborate on the stalled advance.

The Islamic State first captured Mosul on June 10 and within days had pushed nearly to Baghdad as the Iraqi army, which the U.S. government spent billions of dollars to train and equip, collapsed, often without a fight. Only the arrival of Iranian-funded and -trained Shiite militias around the capital — called into action by Shiite religious leaders to face the Sunni Muslim Islamic State — was able to bring the fighting to a virtual stalemate in Baghdad’s suburbs.

The government’s hopes of replicating that success in Tikrit, which was the scene of a brutal massacre of as many as 1,700 government fighters in June and a debacle of an operation to retake the city in July, were quickly dashed by fierce resistance that the poorly trained and led Iraqi army could not overcome.

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