Black-painted ISOF M-ATVs are seen with Iraqi Army Humvees on the road to Al-Qayyarah. Source: Iraqi Ministry of Defence
Iraqi Special Operation Forces (ISOF) – also known as the Counter-Terrorism Service (CTS) – units advancing northwards for the operation to retake the Islamic State-held city of Mosul have been seen with new vehicles.
Photographs released by the Iraqi Ministry of Defence (MoD) on 18 June showed a combined Iraqi Army-ISOF force that it said was in Salah-al-Din province and advancing towards Al-Qayyarah, the current objective in the push towards Mosul, 60 km to the north.
The black-painted ISOF vehicles included Oshkosh M-ATVs, a type of all-terrain armoured vehicle that has not previously been seen in Iraqi service. They were fitted with remote weapon stations armed with heavy machine guns or automatic grenade launchers and some had mast-mounted surveillance cameras and what appeared to be antennas for improvised explosive device (IED) jamming equipment.
The Iraqi MoD also released a video of the forces moving towards Al-Qayyarah that showed that the ISOF units also now have Caiman mine-resistant ambush protected (MRAP) vehicles with additional armoured plates.
The Iraqi Army units seen included ones from the 9th Armoured Brigade equipped with M1A1 tanks and M109 self-propelled howitzers from the 9th Armoured Division.
The Iraqi MoD has previously said that other elements of the 9th Armoured Division are supporting the 71st Brigade of the 15th Infantry Division in an advance on Al-Qayyarah from Makhmur to the east: a route that will require them to cross the Tigris river to reach their stated objective.
The US-led coalition has said that engineers with the 15th Infantry Divisions had been trained by US soldiers to deploy an improved ribbon bridge (IRB) in November 2015. The same bridge was used to cross the Euphrates river during the offensive to recapture Al-Ramadi during the following month.
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