MOSUL, Iraq - United States Army Colonel Pat Work and a small team of about a dozen soldiers drove through western Mosul in two unmarked armored vehicles.

Iraq's Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi had just declared the end of the Islamic State group's caliphate the day before, but the fighting still raged on as Iraqi forces prepared for another big push.

Work had a series of urgent calls to make: to talk face-to-face with generals from the Iraqi Army, the federal police and the Iraqi special forces.