Violence in iraq. We still have the problem of at least three towns under isis occupation. We have no idea whether they will be staybehinds. We have the problem of syria and we also have a country where there are many other islamist elements, divisions between sunni and shiite, kurd and arab, there is something where its an important tactical victory but it doesnt bring stability to iraq. It doesnt eliminate the threat. Isis only was responsible for about 11 of the acts of terrorism in this region in 2016. And thats all of its affiliates. And that sort of puts isis into perspective. Rose we conclude with author and New York Times obituary require Richard Sandomir, he talked to jeff glor about his new book, the pride of the yankees, lou gehrig, gary cooper and the making of a classic. I think i became fascinated about a dozen years ago with the gehrig speech and then i started wondering, why cant i see the whole thing. And then i started getting a little more obsessed with the movie and the speech there and the speech leads to the full movie and the interest in the movie lead me to the archives in Beverly Hills with everything is laid out, the scripts, the letters, the contracts, everything is there, it is just there for me to pluck out and tell the story. Rose war in iraq and Richard Sandomir when we continue. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following bank of america, life better connected. And by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. After nearly a nine month battle of u. S. Backed iraqi forces have retaken the iraqi city of mosul from isis it is a decisive victory in the Larger Campaign against the Islamic State but the liberation comes with a heavy price. The United Nation warns a ballooning humanitarian crisis in the badly damaged city. U. S. And iraqi Officials Say that while the loss of mosul is a significant blow to isis, it is far from a total defeat. In a Statement Released yesterday, senator john mccain said it is better to think of today as the end of the beginning rather than the beginning of the end. Joining me now from irbil is nick paton walsh, senior information correspondent for cnn and im pleased to have him on this program. Nick, describe what the scene is like today. The level in the old city of mosul which marks basically the back end of isis territory in that city. Once the second largest place they could call their own territory in terms of population in that country, down at river level today, still intense clashes, a small pocket of isis fighters dug heavily into what is now rubble. It is almost like the land surface of the moon, the old city of mosul, absolutely destroyed inch by inch by that fighting. But the bombardments often supplied by American Coalition forces and air strike definitely caused some of the fighters to surrender. We saw them walking out toward Iraqi Special forces, intense fighting. It was apparently still going on, frankly when iraqi prime urs of making everybody wait8 finally tbaif his declaration of victory in mosul but still, those smaller pockets not distracting people from the broader fact here that there is perhaps a chapter in iraqs history that is quietly being closed. Yes there are pockets of isis around the country that still have to be confronted but they can no longer claim a major population like mosul as being a place that they can actively contest, charlie. Rose tell me what it has done to mosul . Well, nearly, i think it is fair to say barely a street has escaped unscathed. Certainly the old city, you drive through streets that have been cleared by bull dozenners, remarkably quickly by the iraqi army but they are lined with cars that have been torn up like paper, flipped, pancaked by the sheer devastating forces that have gone along that drive to drive ices out it is hard to imagine anything like it, like a supernatural power swept in and caused devastation. And you move to the other parts of mosul, buildings are pancaked. There as been Intense Coalition firepower used to push isis back into that old city area over the past eight months of grueling offense. There is a huge reconstruction job ahead but some elements of hope because you do already see even a couple of miles or less away from where the fighting was, people out in the streets, at a shop selling kebabs, people selling paint, traffic clogging the streets again. People desperate perhaps to get back to normality after nearly a years worth of fighting around mosul, but also then the broader question of how do they rebuild deep in everybodys hearts, charlie. Rose and how were they able to do it. The iraqis had help from e sheer ten asity of willjust here. Were talking about the fighting which civilians were initially encoveraged to stay in their homes so they didnt see a massive refugee exodus. That slowed the initial part of the offensives in the east because they were scared about getting civilians killed as they advanced. Then we saw Iraqi Special forgses quite high casualty rates. That slowed things too. And now around towards the east i think the success has basically been a lot of Coalition Coordination is fair to say from some of the meetings ive seen helping the iraqi shape their offensive it has been an iraqi proswrect from beginning to end but in the final stages they have been able to get the federal police in play, the iraqi army and then the iraqi u. S. Trained special forces plowing you through the middle that seems to be where so much of the success has come from, coalition and artillery taking out those elements of isis that have dug dug in, and giving that extra edge of accuracy in firepower to Iraqi Special forces which are often kawsessing the chaos of the rubble that is sadly mosul now. Rose how long will it take them to eliminate the last remaining pockets of resistance. Could be a matter of hours, it could be happening as we speak or stretch into today. We dont know you had many are stuck in those last elements of rubble. They are well dug in, and desperate because their future in the hands of iraqi police isnt bright at all. Many stories of execution reported by humanrights groups an also too they are stuck in the remainder of what they viewed as their broader project for an idealogical caliphate it is unlikely they will give up easily, it appears some groups have run out of ammunition or the will to fight back. This could be lengthy possibly but what we saw today was even a hundred yards, dozens of houses, possibly, some of them already reduced to rubble in which these people were dug in. They may have civilians, they are still using as human shields, we simply dont know but it is now down to an incredibly small area, almost to the point of cleanup operation to some degree. I think when abadi announced victory here he was talking in the broader sense. The truth we are still seeing pockets of resistance that are hard to shake, charlie. Rose and we are just beginning to hear, i assume, all of the stories of slaughter and torture and destruction of families. Yes. And bear in mind, that while these individual stories will take years for people to heal around and were sort of seeing how life under isis tbaif many so much absolute horror and terror and of course this war that has plowed through the city has brought its own gastly stories of human suffering. There is still the broader question of iraq having to show heal in sectarian divide. Remember this has come about, this crisis with isis has come about because of the sunni minority, the ethnic Group Feeling disenfranchised, they run the country under Saddam Hussein but he falls and the shia majority takes over, so much government and military. They are on two separate sides so much of the front line, these two ethnic groups during the fight against isis. And the suspicion of each other probably has never been higher but they have to magically now show heal that, bridge that divide to get reconstruction and social healing on track to some degree. That is the biggest task, frankly here, because the fight against isis has done nothing but increase the sectarian hatred in this country and i think the fear possibly now is that the speed of reconstruction and growth of trust has to occur at a rate that has not really been see before in the past 15 years of turmoil sie sadm hussein fell here in and the internal conflict really picked up. That is a steep task indeed. Not steeper than the blood shed and horror frankly of kicking isis out militarily but one possibly more vital if we are not to see in the future some sort of reincarnation of isis. Remember they were a reincarnation you might argue of alqaeda in iraq. What next really depends on how fast society can heal. Rose i know it is very late there, thank you so much for staying up for us. Thanks, charlie. Rose back in a moment. Stay with us. Rose we continue our conversation on the retaking of mosul and the battle against isis, joining me from washington david ignatius, Foreign Affairs columnist for the Washington Post and anthony cordesman, the early a burk chair in strategy at the center for strategic and international studies. Im pleased to have both of them on this program. Now let me begin with you and quote john mccain who said this is the end of the beginning, rather than the beginning of the end. Is he right . I think hes absolutely right. I dont know of anyone who believes that we are able to put an end to islamic extremism or violence in iraq. We still have the problem of at least three towns under isis occupation. We have no idea of whether they will be stay behinds. We have the problem of syria and we also have a country where there are many other islamist elements, divisions between sunni and shiite, kurd and arab, this is something where it is an important tack kal victory but it tactical victory but it doesnt bring stability to iraq. It doesnt eliminate the threat. Isis only was responsible for about 11 of the acts of terrorism in this region in 2016. And thats all of its affiliates. And that sort of puts isis into perspective. Rose marwin saqid a mosul resident told the New York Times theres no such thing as the phrase after isis. Isis is a mentality and the mentality will not end with guns alone. I think thats absolutely correct in every dimension. You have a country with massive unemployment, critical problems in its industries and agricultural sector. It is rated as one of the most corrupt governments in the world. And one with the hayes levels of popular resentment. And you can go on and on. You have the problem of creating stability and security and moving forward in development, and defeating isis alone in one city, important as it is, doesnt shape the future. Rose david, could this victory have been, however you measure it, could it have been a cheeferred much earlier with different policies . Well, if you go back to the beginning of the story, really wanting the movie back, yes, i think if the u. S. Has been able to maintain a presence in iraq, the rise of isis would have been retarded, maybe prevented all together. There is a chain of mistakes that lead us to the isis breakout in 2014, taking mosul while i agree with tony that w are far from the end of this ory, the so many question marks that surround the political future in both iraq and syria, i also think it would be a mistake not to see the victory in mosul and kor responding successes in syria, as important. What has struck me is that an Iraqi Military that had proved really incapable of holding, clearing territory just has become a more efficient fighting force. The Iraqi Counterterrorism service has taken significant casualties, so have other elements of the Iraqi Internal Security Forces in just the elite counterterrorism. In my last two visit to the front around mosul i thought they were headed to a real crackup. That didnt happen, same thing in syria, our local partners have fought better and with less ethnic friks than we fearing a this campaign began. So no, its not the end, its not perfect. Terrible problems ahead. I think we should note the elements of success that are there. Can those elements as you started to mention, syria, are they in place so that they can take raqqa soon . Charlie, i just, two weeks ago was to the west of raqqa in a city called topqa which has been cleared by our syriankurdish led allies. Those forces have now entered raqqa city. The assessment of u. S. Commanders on the scene in syria is that this battle is going better and quicker than they had thought. I think they imagined that this would take certainly to the end of this year to complete the clearing raqqa, big city, had 300,000 people before the war. Theyre thinking it may go a good deal quicker as every syrian who can get out is trying to, there are foreign fighters who wont leave, wont be able to. There are big fights ahead along the lower u freightees which i think are going to be stuff battles. And huge political queions but raqqa is going pretty quickly from what t i am told. Re he we found out any more about the russian suggestion that they had killed al baghdadi. I asked u. S. Commanders and they say they have absolutely no confirmation. They obviously tried hard to track us down, they have no electronic emission that would tell them one way or the other whether he is dead or alive. All that they can say is this if he is still commanding isis forces, it is invisible to the u. S tony, back to the question of the region and the u. S. Role, what do you see for the future . I think some things are clear. No one believes we can halt the air campaign until we finish at least of all the towns and cities. And david pointed out this is strl an action under way. We are talking after all, literally, thousands and thousands of u. S. And allied sortee, it isnt that the iraqi forces improved that much but they had an absolute monopoly on air power. We radically changed our support and training efforts until we put fire support units, multiple rocket launchers, other weapons forward. We put special forces into iraqi combat units to stiffen them and give them the leadership and experience they needed. And if you look at this years defense budget, there is a very substantial amount of money programmed to help iraq and then the kurds and other elements in syria in the future. What isnt clear yet is whether were going to help iraq and syria actually recover, create the kind of political, economic, social structure, patterns of governance that can bring lasting stability. This is something thats being studied but talking to some senior officiatheir reaction has been well, wer talking a lot. But we dont have clear plans yet. And there does seem to be a deep division as to how much aid were going to provide, and whether were going to be involved in anything approaching whats come to be called nation building. Rose okay. Interesting david. I heard you say on television that part of the success, part of the success in terms of the use of American Military whether its on the ground or whether its air strikes, has to do with the president s decision to move authority not only to the secretary of defense, general mattis but also to commanders in the field. Explain that to us. Well, i can give you a very specific example of the way in which the trump administrations delegation of military authority downward has had good effect. In the spring of this year kurdish commanders in syria who were leading the so called Syrian Democratic forces believed that they could surprise isis from the south in this city called topqa to the west of raqqa. If they could get across lake assad topqa has a huge hydroelectric dam, a strategic gateway to raqqa. But they needed to get across this large expanse of water. They had 500 fighters who had probably never seen an aircraft let alone flown in one. And within three days from the proposal from the Syrian Kurdish commander, lets do this, to the actual commencement of the operation, it took place. Im told there was not a single white house meeting to discuss it. It was del gated to general townsend who is our commander in baghdad, who organized this. Who got the people on the osprey helicopters, got the zodiac boats to take heavy equipment across the lake and bam they ended up there on the ground. They fought their way into topqa, it was a bloody battle. They had im told over a hundred killed, 300 bonded, that is a lot of people to get killed. They took out the isis force that had been entrenched there for almost three years. The Obama Administration, i cant imagine there not being an extensive interagency process, white house meetings, sit room discussions back and forth. That is the way the Obama Administration did things. In this case it just went right to the commanders and it happened quickly and this is a significant tactical success in the raqqa campaign. Rose so what is going to change because of whatever the president and the president of russia agreed on with respect to syria . Tony youre smiling, i think. I dont think they knew. Weve heard about deescalation zones. Its not quite clear what that means. Theres a serious question as to the extent to which iran and the assad forces are trying to establish some kind of corridor that would connect with the shiite elements in iraq and then on to iran. And part of that corridor potentially would go through the deescalation zone. It says nothing about governance in syria. Nothing about stability, what happens to the people. It is one of these areas of rhetoric where at the end of it you know almost less hearing the words than you did before the announcement. Rose david . Well, i agree with tony. Theres a lot of uncertainty about what this what this means. I think the watchword for this whole campaign, i think, is the u. S. Has decided the limits of what it can do, its leverage, its ability to shape the future so there is a kind of ad hoc improvised quality. That is the case with the u. S. Russian cooperation. Three weeks ago