In June, the Islamic State and other insurgents seized Iraq’s second-largest city, Mosul, in a rapid advance across northern and eastern Iraq and towards Baghdad.
According to then-Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, the blame lay with top military commanders. He dismissed several within days, including Lieutenant General Mahdi al-Gharawi.
Iraqi soldiers who departed from Mosul spoke of mysterious orders to leave the city to the Islamic State, “The army withdrew from Mosul and that withdrawal is the responsibility of the senior commanders.”
Gharawi and other commanders reportedly arrived in Mosul from Baghdad on Monday night, but then departed on Tuesday morning for Kirkuk, handing over responsibility of that city to Kurdish forces.
See Iraq Special: Did the al-Maliki Government Abandon Mosul — and Why?
Now Reuters has posted Gharawi’s version of events. He says he is a scapegoat for a decision made by others, including the Prime Minister.
Gharawi says he stood firm, and did not give the final order to abandon the city. Others involved in the battle endorse that claim and say Gharawi fought until the city was overrun. It was only then that he fled.
Gharawi says three people could have given the final order [for withdrawal]: Aboud Qanbar, at the time the defense ministry’s deputy chief of staff; Ali Ghaidan, then commander of the ground forces; or Maliki himself, who personally directed his most senior officers from Baghdad. The secret of who decided to abandon Mosul, Gharawi says, lies with these three men. Gharawi says a decision by Ghaidan and Qanbar to leave Mosul’s western bank sparked mass desertions as soldiers assumed their commanders had fled. A senior Iraqi military official backs that assertion.
How Mosul Fell — An Iraqi General Disputes Baghdad’s Story
Ned Parker, Isabel Coles, and Raheem Salman
….How Mosul was lost, and who gave the order to abandon the fight, have, until now, been unclear. There has been no official version: only soldiers’ stories of mass desertions and claims by infantry troops that they followed orders to flee.
In June, Maliki accused unnamed regional countries, commanders and rival politicians of plotting the fall of Mosul, but has since remained quiet.
Nevertheless, Baghdad has pinned the blame on Gharawi. In late August, he was charged by the defense ministry with dereliction of duty. He is now awaiting the findings of an investigative panel and then a military trial. If found guilty, he could be sentenced to death. (Four federal police officers who served under Gharawi are also in custody awaiting trial, and could not be reached.) Parliament also plans to hold hearings into the loss of Mosul.
An investigation by Reuters shows that higher-level military officials and Maliki himself share at least some of the blame. Several of Iraq’s senior-most commanders and officials have detailed for the first time how troop shortages and infighting among top officers and Iraqi political leaders played into Islamic State’s hands and fueled panic that led to the city’s abandonment. Maliki and his defense minister made an early critical mistake, they say, by turning down repeated offers of help from the Kurdish fighting force known as the peshmerga.
Gharawi’s role in the debacle is a matter of debate. A member of the country’s dominant Shi’ite sect, he alienated Mosul’s Sunni majority before the battle, according to the provincial governor and many citizens. That helped give rise to IS sleeper cells inside Mosul. One Iraqi officer under his command faulted Gharawi for not rallying the troops for a final stand.
For his part, Gharawi says he stood firm, and did not give the final order to abandon the city. Others involved in the battle endorse that claim and say Gharawi fought until the city was overrun. It was only then that he fled.
Gharawi says three people could have given the final order: Aboud Qanbar, at the time the defense ministry’s deputy chief of staff; Ali Ghaidan, then commander of the ground forces; or Maliki himself, who personally directed his most senior officers from Baghdad. The secret of who decided to abandon Mosul, Gharawi says, lies with these three men. Gharawi says a decision by Ghaidan and Qanbar to leave Mosul’s western bank sparked mass desertions as soldiers assumed their commanders had fled. A senior Iraqi military official backs that assertion.
None of the three men have commented publicly on their decisions in Mosul. Maliki has declined Reuters requests for an interview for this article. Qanbar has not responded, while Ghaidan could not be reached.
Lieutenant General Qassim Atta, a military spokesman with close ties to Maliki, told Reuters last week that Gharawi “above all others … failed in his role as commander.” The rest, he said, “will be revealed before the judiciary.”
In many ways, Gharawi’s story is a window into Iraq. The Shi’ite general has been a key figure since 2003, when the Shi’ites began gaining power after the United States toppled Saddam Hussein and his Sunni-dominated Baath Party. Shi’ite leaders once saluted Gharawi as a hero, while Sunnis see him as a murderer who used Iraq’s war on extremism as a cover for extorting money from businesses and menacing innocent people with arrests and killings.
Gharawi rose through a military riven by sectarian splits, corruption and politics. He is now trapped by those same forces. The decision to punish him and ignore the role of higher-level figures shows not just that rebuilding the military will be difficult, but also why the country risks breakup. As Mosul proved, the Iraqi army is a failed institution at the heart of a failing state.
Gharawi, in his own telling, has become a scapegoat, a victim of the deal-making and alliances that keep Iraq’s political and military elite in place. Ghaidan and Qanbar, longtime confidantes of Maliki, have been dispatched to a pensioned retirement. Gharawi, who is living in his home town in the south of Iraq, says his bosses are pinning the faults of a broken system on him.
“They want just to save themselves from these accusations,” he told Reuters during a visit to Baghdad two weeks ago. “The investigation should include the highest commanders and leadership….Everyone should say what they have, so the people know.”
