Diyala campaign
The Diyala province campaign was a series of operations conducted by coalition forces against Iraqi insurgents and a number of bombing and guerrilla attacks against the security forces in Diyala Governorate of Iraq, with the purpose of control of the province.
Background[edit]
In mid-October 2006, al-Qaeda announced the creation of Islamic state of Iraq (ISI),[4] replacing the Mujahideen Shura Council (MSC) and its al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).
In 2006, Diyala province had special significance for the insurgents. When Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was head of al-Qaeda in Iraq, he designated Diyala as the capital of the Islamic caliphate he planned to establish in the country. He located his headquarters in a village north-west of Baqubah. In April 2006, on Saddam Hussein's birthday, insurgents launched a coordinated offensive throughout the province, attacking Muqdadiyah, Balad Ruz, Kanaan, Khalis, Khan Bani Sa'ad and the capital Baqubah. The insurgents used the rural areas east and southeast of the capital, from Balad Ruz to Turki as supply bases for their bombing campaigns in Baghdad and Diyala. They were also based in the Diyala river valley, northeast of Baqubah, where they fought for control of Muqdadiyah, an important line of communication to Lake Hamrin, Kirkuk and Iran. The insurgents also had control of the tribal areas of Khan Bani Sa'ad south of Baqubah to Salman Pak, south-east of Baghdad.[5]
Prelude[edit]
Shortly after the insurgent victory in Baghdad after Operation Together Forward insurgents began, little by little, moving their resources from Baghdad, now more than 80 percent under insurgent control, and Al Anbar province, which was also almost completely under insurgent control, to the province of Diyala northeast of Baghdad. The first signs of increased insurgent activity in Diyala came after U.S. forces found an insurgent bunker complex near the village of Turki and fought a bloody battle. Also a few weeks later fighting between police and insurgents after an attack on Baquba's police headquarters shut down the city, closing the university, schools and most stores, and clearing the streets of everyone, except a few who attempted to stock up on food. At least 55 militants were killed in clashes in the preceding days, according to anonymous police sources. During the fighting a mass grave with 28 bodies was discovered. After that U.S. and Iraqi forces begin raids in the city. The morgue in the city reports by the beginning of December 2006 that it had received 102 bodies in the previous two weeks. After the announcement of a new attempt by the U.S. and Iraqi security forces to take back the streets of Baghdad the insurgents started to speed up their move and it is believed that the reason behind the little resistance found by the security forces in Baghdad during Operation Law and Order is that most of the insurgents had moved to Diyala.
The Campaign[edit]
Baquba falls[edit]
On Christmas Day, it was reported that the capital of the province, Baquba, had fallen under insurgent control. An Iraqi news cameraman went to the city and reported seeing hundreds of gunmen with AK-47s in cars and pickups parading through the city. There was no sign of the security forces except for the bodies of a few executed by the insurgents.[6][7] After that, there were increased insurgent attacks on the U.S. and Iraqi forces around Baquba and in the rest of the province.
In mid-January, U.S. and Iraqi forces conducted a series of raids that resulted in 93 insurgents killed and 57 captured.[8] Despite that, however, the insurgents had some successes early in the campaign, mainly when they shot down a Black Hawk helicopter on January 20, killing twelve U.S. soldiers. The helicopter was carrying mostly officers from the U.S. National Guard. The dead included a colonel who was the top American military doctor in Iraq.
In January 2007, it was reported[9] that Sunni insurgents were able to kidnap the mayor of Baquba and blow up his office, despite promises from American and Iraqi military officials that the situation in the city was "reassuring and under control". The city at its peak had over 300,000 residents, but a February 2007 report labeled the city a "ghost town" as most residents had fled.
Iraqi security forces under attack[edit]
In two separate incidents in the beginning of March, insurgents captured 32 members of the Iraqi security forces. The bodies of 14 captured policemen were found shortly after, and the 18 other soldiers and policemen were shown on television with a message that they would be executed. Suicide bombers continued to attack in Diyala, targeting not only military but also civilian targets such as a cafe in Balad Ruz, where 30 people were killed on March 7. The capture of policemen continued, with another 10 policemen captured and 1 killed when insurgents overran a police station in the town of Hibhib. The bodies of five of the policemen were found the next month. Also, 20 Iraqi soldiers and policemen were captured at the beginning of April and were executed several days later.[10]
On March 23, the provincial director of civil defense, Colonel Ahmed Kadhim Jawad, was killed in Khalis.[11]
Reinforcements arrive[edit]
On March 13, 700 men from the Army's 5th Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment, which includes Stryker armored vehicles, were sent from Baghdad to Diyala as reinforcements to the 3,500 U.S. and 20,000 Iraqi soldiers already in the province.[12] The next day, as the first batch of the reinforcements was moving close to the outskirts of Baquba, the Stryker convoy was hit by machine-gun, RPG and mortar fire. In the ensuing chaos one American soldier was killed, 12 were wounded and two Stryker armored vehicles were destroyed.[13] The same day, in two other separate incidents, two more American soldiers were killed in the province.[14]
Attack on Qubah[edit]
On March 24, the U.S. military started operations to retake the Baqubah River valley. The operation started with an attack on the insurgent-held village of Qubah. Up to 13 Chinooks, Blackhawks and Apache gunships from FOB Warhorse flew in 241 soldiers on the edge of Qubah and heavy street fighting ensued as artillery fire provided cover firing into the surrounding palm groves. At the same time, a convoy of 19 Humvees, two Bradley fighting vehicles and several other vehicles approached from the opposite end. The soldiers encountered several machine gun nests in the town. Some of the fighting was almost hand to hand. The Apaches strafed insurgent positions with cannons and sent Hellfire missiles into buildings soldiers were attacking from the ground. By sunset 16 insurgents were killed and 3 American soldiers were wounded in the initial clashes. As the convoy tried to return to base, they were hit two times by roadside bombs. The Apaches identified the triggermen and killed up to 12 more insurgents. In one of the blasts, 4 American soldiers were killed and 2 were wounded. By the close of the operation on March 24 only the town of Zaganiya was left as the last insurgent stronghold in the Baqubah river valley.
Khalis massacre[edit]
On March 29, three suicide bombers in a coordinated attack on the mostly Shia town of Khalis killed 53 people and wounded 103. This coincided with a double suicide bombing in Baghdad on the Shaab area marketplace that killed 82 people, including many women and children, and wounded 138 others.
Diyala cut off, sectarian war intensifies[edit]
By early April it was reported that insurgents had taken control of the roads between Diyala and Baghdad. Large swaths of territory were in insurgent hands and the U.S. military was stretched thin. Meanwhile, sectarian warfare intensified in the province with a total of 62 bodies being recovered between April 3 and 7. Most of the sectarian killings is done in revenge because after the mass killings of Sunnis by Shiites in Baghdad a large number of Sunnis fled to seek refuge in Baquba. That contributed to the ranks of the Sunni insurgents and also brought a greater sense of hatred toward the Shi'a population of Diyala. Also, even before Baghdad Security Plan, the Shi'a dominated military and police units in Diyala were conducting mass killings of Sunnis. Now, as Diyala has become a new safe haven for Sunni insurgents, like Al Anbar province which has already been overrun by the insurgents, that has changed were the Sunnis are striking back at the Shiites.
Because of the crackdown in Baghdad, many Shiite Mahdi Army units fled from the capital to Diyala where they took up positions in the western parts of the province and carried out attacks against American and Iraqi military targets.[2]
5th Squadron, 73rd Cavalry Regiment under fire[edit]
One of the American units that took on the most casualties during the campaign was the 5th Squadron, 73rd Cavalry Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division. The squadron came to Iraq at the beginning of September 2006 with 330 men, but half-way through their deployment almost 100 men from the original roster had been killed or wounded, all in the province of Diyala. By April 23, the squadron lost 20 soldiers to hostile action in the province and more than 80 had been wounded. They took part in the bloody Battle of Turki before the campaign and had been constantly under hit-and-run attacks later on. TF 300 conducted combat operations clearing the Diyala River Valley of AQIZ and IISI forces. With that the squadron became the only squadron of the U.S. Army to lose almost a third of its force in the Iraq war.
Further operations[edit]
In January 2008 the Multinational Force Iraq and New Iraqi Army launched a new offensive (codenamed Operation Phantom Phoenix) in the region to eradicate the remaining insurgents in Diyala and the neighboring Salah ad Din Governorate.