ISIS Takes Mosul Dam + More Mayhem in Afghanistan = Bad Times Ahead for Iran

The Kurdish pesh merga seem yet to have tallied a single win over ISIS, as Alissa Rubin and Tim Arango report that the Salafis have taken control over Mosul dam:

The dam, which sits on the Tigris River and is about 30 miles northwest of the city of Mosul, provides electricity to Mosul and controls the water supply for a large amount of territory. A report published in 2007 by the United States government, which had been involved with work on the dam, warned that should it fail, a 65-foot wave of water could be unleashed across areas of northern Iraq.

Atheel al-Nujaifi, the governor of Nineveh Province, whose capital is Mosul, said in a telephone interview from northern Iraq, where he has fled, that ISIS had secured the dam after what he called an “organized retreat” of the pesh merga.

ISIS seized Mosul, which is Iraq’s second-largest city, on June 10, and began its latest offensive this week. In a statement issued on a social media account believed to belong to the group, it claimed that it had captured the dam and vowed to continue its offensive northward as it consolidates control and continues to realize its goal of establishing an Islamic caliphate that bridges the borders of Syria and Iraq. 

“Our Islamic State forces are still fighting in all directions and we will not step down until the project of the caliphate is established, with the will of God,” the statement said.

In southern Afghanistan yesterday the Taliban staged two gruesome insider police attacks:

In one attack, a police officer secretly working for the Taliban poisoned five colleagues at a compound in southern Afghanistan, then invited insurgents inside to shoot the stricken officers to death and steal their weapons, the officials said.

Gulab Khan, the provincial head of criminal investigations, said the other assault targeted a national police checkpoint on the outskirts of Tarin Kowt, the capital of Uruzgan Province, where Taliban fighters killed the guard on duty, then executed five others as they slept. One officer, believed to be in league with the insurgents, escaped with the militant fighters, according to Doost Mohammad Nayab, the spokesman for the provincial governor. 

Mr. Khan said the killing of Afghan forces by their colleagues was an increasingly urgent problem as the American-led foreign forces prepare to wind down their presence in the country’s 13-year war, leaving the Afghan government to fight the insurgents on its own.

“If we have local police who are easily switching to the Taliban, soon the aftermath will be grave and will pose a big threat to the Afghan government,” he said.

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Taliban insurgents have been attacking areas previously considered relatively safe while operating with impunity from stretches of the country that were once contested. While some Western officials say internal data suggest that violence is down from a year ago, other indications, including a recent United Nations report on civilian casualties, contradict that assertion.

Coming on the heels of the high-profile attack that killed Army Maj. Gen. Harold Green at the top military training academy in Afghanistan a legitimate question is whether the country will unravel before U.S. forces can make their exit at the end of the year.

With no evidence that ISIS can be halted and the Taliban soon to be back in power in Afghanistan, I will say it once again, the pressure on Iran is going to be extreme.