all of us in america have generally paid for our gas and oil all along, and i m sure that we will continue to do so in the future. we are not in iraq to seize anybody s oil. mattis is working on options to accelerate the fight against isis for president trump to review at the end of the month. the key goals, get mosul and raqqa syria out of isis hands. but mattis, an iraq veteran himself, not exactly committing on more troops or weapons to the fight. we owe some degree of confidentiality on exactly how we are going to do that and the sequencing of that fight. so that we don t expose to the enemy what it is that we have in mind in terms of the timing of the operations. the pentagon is looking at several ideas, including arming kurdish rebels, which turkey opposes, and even putting u.s. conventional troops on the ground inside syria.
then launch counterattacks at iraqi forces more fixed positions. the fighting in the days ahead expected to be fierce. fr in the planning for months. it has not been a secret. the iraqi military wanted to give civilians time to flee and warn them. donald trump, who obviously does not have military experience, has criticized the lack of secrecy surrounding the offensive. here s what he said in the last debate. let me tell you. mosul is so sad. we had mosul but when she left, when she took everybody out, she lost mosul. now we re fighting again to get mosul. the problem with mosul and what they wanted to do was they wanted to get the leaders of isis, who they felt were in mosul. whatever happened to the element of surprise? okay? we announce we re going after mosul. i ve been reading about going after mosul now for about how long is it, hillary, three months? these people have all left. they ve all left. the element of surprise.
ahead expected to be fierce. isis has controlled mow u.s. is for more than two years. the iraqi military wanted to give civilians time to free and warn them. donald trump, who obviously does not have military experience, has criticized the lack of secrecy surrounding the offensive. here s what he said in the last debate. let me tell you. mosul is so sad. we had mosul but when she left, when she took everybody out, she lost mosul. now we re fighting again to get mosul. the problem with mosul and what they wanted to do was they wanted to get the leaders of isis, who they felt were in mosul. whatever happened to the element of surprise? okay. we announce we re going after mosul. i ve been reading we ve been going after mosul for how long is it now, three months? these people have all left. they ve all left. the element of surprise. douglas mcarthur, george patton spinning in their graves when they see the stupidity of our country. trump s remarks didn t sit
minutes. today marks the sixth day of a major offensive in iraq to retake the city of mosul from isis control and it s happening as reports are streaming out of the embattled region that isis militants may have executed 284 civilians. matt, can you give us an update on the fighting taking place in some of these reports we are getting that isis executed up to 284 civilians? reporter: what we are seeing right now are the early reports of this, and we don t know if it s true, and the united nations said they are opening an investigation into the allegations, but if they are true and even the early allegations of the 284 people being killed that is consistent with how the islamic state has behaved in other battles, and now, remember, ayman, this is a group that says it has divine
providence backing it and how do you explain to your followers if you are losing a battle you are also going to be blessed by god, and one thing they do is try to blame rebels or spies within their midst and execute them and this is the kind of thing we have seen along the euphrates river corridor earlier this year as they were starting to lose battles, the islamic state would start to execute their own ranks and civilians accusing them of being spies and this is consistent with their own propaganda, they can t lose a battle and it has to be because of spies in their midst, and there was a 12-hour long gun battle in a city an hour and a half south of mosul and that s part of isis, another signal that isis is probably losing or knows they are losing the fight in mosul, and they wanted to demonstrate they have the capability to lash out elsewhere, and it was an