U.S. Says Battle for Iraq's Mosul Could be a Year Away

The battle to retake Mosul, Iraq's largest jihadist hub, could take up to a year to plan, U.S. President Barack Obama's envoy for the coalition against the Islamic State group said Friday.

"I would see that Mosul will probably go as an operation within a year... The operation will kick off within a year," John Allen told reporters in Baghdad.

The northwestern city is Iraq's second largest. IS seized it on June 10 and it has since used it as a headquarters and a base from which to launch further offensives.

"It is a battle that is going to obviously demand as much planning and preparation as it possibly can," said Allen, who met Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi on Thursday.

Mosul "was the place where Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi exposed himself, the place where the difficulties of the ISF (Iraqi security forces) really began to cascade," he said.

Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed caliph of the so-called Islamic State his group declared over parts of Iraq and Syria, made a rare appearance at Mosul's mosque in early July.

The federal army collapsed when jihadists thrust into Mosul in early June, abandoning a huge arsenal of U.S.-made vehicles and weaponry that turned IS into an even more formidable foe.

Allen said it would take time to restructure the army and make it a force capable of winning the war against IS.

He praised Abadi's plan to build a National Guard that could incorporate Sunni tribal forces at the provincial level and assist the federal army.