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By Phil Stewart KABUL (Reuters) - New U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said on Saturday he would not telegraph the precise timing of an upcoming Iraqi offensive to retake the city of Mosul from Islamic State militants, after a U.S. military briefing caused an uproar. Two influential Republican senators, John McCain and Lindsey Graham, sent a scathing letter to the White House on Friday complaining about a Thursday briefing that predicted a Mosul offensive likely to start in April or May, involving 20,000 to 25,000 Iraqi and Kurdish forces. "These disclosures not only risk the success of our mission, but could also cost the lives of U.S., Iraqi, and coalition forces," McCain and Graham wrote to President Barack Obama. He added: "Even if I knew exactly when that was going to be, I wouldn't tell you." Mosul, which had a population of more than 1 million people, was captured by Islamic State fighters in June and is the largest city in the group's self-declared caliphate, a stretch of territory that straddles the border between northern Iraq and eastern Syria.More...