Extremists plotting attacks on West from Raqqa

“After suffering a string of losses over the previous year, including the symbolically important city of Dabiq, Syria, ISIL faces a decision point: Hold the line in Mosul or beat a retreat”.

He said US -backed forces in Syria would try to “head it off” by making a move on Raqqa sooner rather than later.

After seizing control of large parts of Iraq and neighbouring Syria in mid-2014, IS declared a cross-border “caliphate”, imposed its harsh interpretation of Islamic law and committed widespread atrocities.

What worries him about Iraq now, he said, is what happens next in Mosul: “About what keeps me up at night, it’s got to do with the kind of the acceptance of this liberation and the follow-on political situation solution that’s in place in Mosul after the liberation”. Yet the complexity of preparations to take Raqqa have left the offensive’s timetable an open question. Turkey has also expressed an interest in joining the battles in Mosul and Raqqa. Before the start of the civil war in Syria, the provincial capital was believed to have a population of 220,000.

Tens of thousands of Iraqi fighters have been advancing on Mosul from the south, east and north after the offensive was launched on October 17 to retake the last major Iraqi city under ISIL control.

The residents that remained have endured oppressive rules on dress codes and bans on foreign contacts that are enforced with brutal public executions and lashings.

At the same time, pushing ISIS out of Raqqa will not put an end to the group in Syria either.

Raqqa first gained notoriety as the site of the horrific executions of American and Western hostages by the ISIS fighter known as Jihadi John.

Pentagon officials appear anxious to begin a USA -backed assault on the Islamic State’s capital of Raqqa to stop western terrorist plots. Growing fears that Turkey and Iraq could be headed for war are probably overblown, but Ankara is definitely creating more knots for the next US president to untangle after ISIS’s bloody last stand is finally over. Ankara has pledged to prevent them from joining a Raqqa offensive.

“We need to go pretty soon”, Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend said.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said, “NATO has played a key role, has been in a front line in a fight against terrorism for many, many years with our operation in Afghanistan, training Iraqi officers supporting Tunisia, Jordan and many other ways”.

As Ed Morrissey writes, “If ISIS believes that the coalition has enough resources for a siege and ground assault on ISIS” last remaining significant city, they might be tempted to pull out of Mosul and dare the USA and its allies to try.

Operation Euphrates Shield has seen both the Daesh and PKK/PYD terrorist groups targeted by the opposition Free Syrian Army plus Turkish tanks, artillery and aircraft. But U.S. forces will not be part of the “occupation” or forces holding Mosul, Carter told NBC.

A coming offensive to oust Islamic State fighters from their main Syria stronghold at Raqqa poses tougher political challenges than the effort in Mosul, Iraq, and could take longer, the USA commander of anti-IS coalition forces said Wednesday. Iraqi intelligence sources tell WTOP that if Baghdadi chooses to run, his options appear to be limited to the road leading west to Raqqa, Syria, and the underground.

Townsend stressed that Kurdish militia fighters would be a part of the ground force used to isolate Raqqa.