Three troops killed in Basra attack

BBC World News ^ | 26 August 2003 | n/c

[BlackVeil]

British troops have sealed off the area of the attack Three British troops have been killed and one seriously wounded in an ambush in the southern Iraqi city of Basra, the Ministry of Defence has confirmed.

According to reports, the soldiers' vehicle came under fire from a pick-up truck as they travelled along one of the city's main streets. There was an exchange of fire, followed by an explosion.

Soldiers have sealed off the area of the attack around the University of Basra and are searching vehicles. Journalists were not being allowed to enter the area.

"The casualty has been taken to hospital for treatment and the incident has been contained," an MoD spokeswoman said.

TV pictures from Basra suggested the situation was calm at present.

Investigation launched

"This is a difficult time for all concerned and our priority now is to inform the families of those concerned," said the MoD spokeswoman.

The ministry has started an investigation. It says it will release more details about the attack shortly. The deaths bring to 10 the number of British soldiers killed by hostile action in Iraq since US President George W Bush declared major combat operations over on 1 May.

A British soldier, Captain David Jones, died in Basra just over a week ago after a bomb attack on the ambulance he was travelling in.

The attack followed rioting over the lack of utilities in Basra as temperatures soared, but the city had been reported to be relatively quiet in the last week.

[PatrioticCowboy]

ping

[PatrioticCowboy]

ping

[laconic]

This atrocity occurred in the supposedly "quiet" Shia part of the country. So much for the "cakewalk" and being greeted with flowers and smiles.

[BlackVeil]

Basra is very much on the boil, with several grievances by the local population. Basically, they are all unemployed, and as the contracts at Basra and Um Qasr have been given to Kuwaiti firms, a lot are going to stay that way.

It is only a matter of time before the situation in the Shia areas blows like a gasket. One of the problems about the hunt for Sadaam Hussein is that if they do find him and kill him, it will bring the day of the Shia resistance a lot closer. At the moment, they are afraid of Sadaam coming back. When we show them that is impossible, the security situation will deteriorate.

[laconic]

Veil, I felt bad about the future (and for these soldiers and their families) when I read the article about this morning's attack in Basra. When I read your cogent analysis, I felt much worse. We seem to have gotten into something that Rumsfeld and Co. at the Pentagon never envisioned but which op-ed writers like Charley Reese did. Who among us believes that liberating Iraq is worth Hillary Clinton in the White House, who will appoint world federalist Supreme Court judges like Ginsberg who "look to international law" not the US Constitution; who will enact a sweeping radical social agenda; and who will ensure through all sorts of tinkering with the voting structure that they never leave office? As much respect as I have for our military and the brave men and women who won a decisive victory, I wonder more than ever what we're doing there and just how destructive an impact it will have on conservative politics in the US. It seems the scales are tipping.

[Dane]

Here is some historical perspective. Not everything is another Vietnam.

Occupational Deja Vu
July 3, 2003 | |
James Carafano

Most Americans learn about war from history books, where battles end on one page and peace starts on the next. Reality is different. As we’re seeing in post-war Iraq, there’s a shadowland between war and peace -- a difficult transition period that few occupied nations escape.

We would do well to study our own history more closely. After World War II, U.S. troops in Europe faced many of the same problems that coalition troops in Iraq do now. Austria, which American soldiers occupied along with British, French and Russian forces until 1955, offers a case in point.

Unlike Germany, Austria was officially a “liberated” country. GIs in Vienna set about doing much the same as the Americans are doing in Baghdad -- keeping enemy troops contained, providing a safe environment, feeding civilians, training new security forces, purging hardliners and preparing the people for self-rule.

As is the case today, the initial months of the Austrian occupation were bleak and hardly encouraging. On occasion, U.S. troops were harassed and killed. Daily reports listed unexplained fires, explosions, ambushes and cut communications wires. Many were suspected to be the work of covert Nazi agents trained in sabotage and guerrilla warfare. But even ordinary Austrians quickly grew resentful of their American liberators. “They jostle us in passing on the street,” complained one homesick GI who expected to be welcomed as a “conquering hero.”

Indeed, the Austrians, as well as all the liberated countries of Europe, had little to be joyous about. Conditions were appalling. Daily reports listed the greatest concerns: few jobs, rampant crime, riots, rumor-mongering and tremendous uncertainty. Most Europeans expected to freeze or starve to death in the winter of 1945-46, six months after the war was over.

The Americans in Austria also made many of the same mistakes made now in Iraq. Preparations for the post-conflict period were inadequate. Troops were poorly trained and organized for the task, the various government agencies in charge of coordinating relief didn’t work well together, and priorities weren’t always settled. It seems the strongest American tradition with regards to occupation duties is a tradition of forgetting how to do them.

Yet the occupation of Austria was a dramatic success. Nazi harassment failed to win popular support, and opposition faded after a few months. Even more important, dynamic leaders from all sides of the political spectrum quickly came to the fore and agreed that peace and reconstruction were more important than settling old scores. In fact, if not for the outbreak of the Cold War, by 1948 all the Allied troops might well have gone home.

The prospects in Iraq are similar. The people there have the resources and the talent they need to rebuild. If the leaders of the three major ethnic groups are willing to work together, and if the people can put the fear of Saddam Hussein’s Baathist Party behind them, then the chances for a brief occupation and a quick withdrawal of coalition troops are good. But if the Iraqis refuse to take responsibility for their own destiny, the prospects are not good.

At the same time, Iraq’s neighbors need to shift their energies from criticizing the Americans to supporting efforts to get the country get back on its feet. It is in no one’s interest, except the Baathists, to turn Baghdad into Beirut or Iraq into Bosnia.

Meanwhile, America needs to take deep breath and face reality. Even under the best circumstances, occupation duties are not an easy or pretty task. U.S. forces should continue to focus on providing a safe and secure environment by stamping out remnants of Baathist opposition, setting up domestic Iraqi security forces, and turning over the country to self-rule sooner rather than later.

###

James Carafano, author of the book “Waltzing into the Cold War: The Struggle for Occupied Austria,” is a senior research fellow for defense and homeland security at The Heritage Foundation (heritage.org)

LINK

[laconic]

I never claimed it was another Vietnam; there aren't the major countries on its border supplying it with armaments, supply lines to the radicals aren't offlimits, and there aren't many Kathy Boudins actively taking up their cause in the US this time. But it also isn't another Austria. Unlike Iraq, Austria was a very homogeneous country and there weren't competing ethnic or religious factions. Aside from communism, there was no motivating radical force sparking anti-occupation violence (and the Soviets never found it very much in their interest to stir violence against the West in Germany or Austria nor was there much postwar interest in a return of the Nazis). There was also no large core of nuts in foreign countries bordering Austria to support insurrection. Also, as I recall, what violent opposition as there was in Austria simmered down as the months rolled on; in Iraq, it seems to be stoking into greater (and unfortunately, more sophisticated) attacks by the day (acknowledged publicly by Gen. Abizaid just yesterday).

By the way, if you want to see an excellent film on the Austrian occupation, rent The Third Man with Orson Welles and Jos. Cotten.

[ConservativeMan55]

You are equating two or three different groups of people into one.

The Iraqi's. The REAL Iraqi's did greet us with flowers and smiles.

The snipers and the criminals, the ba'athists, and the foreigners are the ones attacking our troops.

[Dane]

Yes Iraq isn't Austria. Iraq has most of it's infrastructure reletively intact, except for the baathists or terrorists from Syria trying to blow it up. Germany and Austria were in ruins after World War II and they had to look forward to the winter of 45-46, while the worst season(summer) in Iraq is going to be coming to a close in the next month or so.

The point being is that Austria was not easy, neither will be Iraq. Remember it has been about four months since the major hostilities have ended, and they ended while the worst season was coming up, summer. We weren't out of Austria and Germany after World War II for three years after the war. The US won't be out of Iraq in the next month. It's a long process and there will be bumps in the road, like there was in Austria and Germany. It was actually easier back then for the military since it didn't have a 24 hour press that was openly hostile to their actions.

[laconic]

You may be right about the majority of Iraqis; I don't know, but I do know it doesn't take many to support the types of attacks we're enduring. My responsive question is: Is it worth it? Is it worth losing the White House, losing the Supreme Court for generations, losing the social battles here in the US all for some country of really minimal importance to us?

[mikegi]

Also, as I recall, what violent opposition as there was in Austria simmered down as the months rolled on; in Iraq, it seems to be stoking into greater (and unfortunately, more sophisticated) attacks by the day (acknowledged publicly by Gen. Abizaid just yesterday).

It "seems to be stoking into greater" attacks. Do you have any numbers to back that up? I don't see any evidence of an increase in the number of attacks. There was the expected flurry of revenge attacks after we killed Uday and his brother but that has died down.

[Filibuster_60]

in Iraq, it seems to be stoking into greater (and unfortunately, more sophisticated) attacks by the day (acknowledged publicly by Gen. Abizaid just yesterday).

More sophisticated, quite possibly. I'm not sure about "greater" though. It hardly makes a difference in my opinion. The guerillas can't win and they know it as well as we do. But their objective is to continue bleeding the coalition, militarily and financially, and so far they've been more successful than many expected.

[M Kehoe]

Good morning.

My responsive question is: Is it worth it?

Let's do the math. Without emotion. Lets say that 2 soldiers are killed a day (error on the high side). That's 730 troops killed a year. On 9-11 we lost 3000 people in a day. So if we loose 3000 people ever other year (since it hasn't happened again), mathematically we are still way ahead.

Because if we don't kill them over there, we will surely have to kill them here.

President Bush recognizes this fact, and so do a vast majority of the American people.

5.56mm

[TexKat]

The British flag remains hoisted over the empty British embassy in Baghdad August 23, 2003. Diplomats and staff at Britain's embassy in Baghdad have evacuated the building after a 'credible threat' of attack, the Foreign Office said. Three British soldiers were killed and another was seriously wounded in Iraq's second city of Basra on Saturday, a British military spokesman said. Photo by Aladin Abdel Naby/Reuters REUTERS/Aladin Abdel Naby

British soldiers inspect the scene where three colleagues were killed in Basra August 23, 2003. Three British soldiers were killed on Saturday in Iraq (news - web sites)'s second city of Basra when their vehicle crashed into a wall after being pursued and fired at by gunmen in a car, local witnesses said. REUTERS/Atef Hassan

3 British Soldiers Killed in Iraq Attack

By STEVEN R. HURST, Associated Press Writer

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Three British soldiers were killed and one seriously wounded Saturday during a guerrilla attack in the southern Iraqi port city of Basra. To the north, American forces reported killing two Iraqi Turkomen who opened fire when the U.S. soldiers arrived to put down an ethnic clash in the city of Tuz Kharmato.

In Baghdad, meanwhile, some U.N. staff returned to work in tents set up at the battered Canal Hotel compound. Investigators and soldiers searched piles of debris there for human remains and clues in the deadly suicide truck bombing Tuesday that killed at least 23 people, including the top U.N. envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello.

In Basra, British military spokesman Capt. Hisham Halawi said the military still had no details on Saturday's attack, but termed it a guerrilla operation. Witnesses said an unknown number of men in a pickup truck shot up the British four-wheel drive vehicle in the city center.

As of Saturday, 273 U.S. soldiers have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq, according to the military.

The British government has reported 48 deaths. Denmark's military has reported one death.

On or since May 1, when President Bush (news - web sites) declared that major combat operations in Iraq had ended, 135 U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq, according to the latest military figures. Counting only combat deaths, 65 Americans and 11 Britons have died since the Bush declaration.

In Tuz Kharmato, 110 miles north of Baghdad, U.S. soldiers killed two Turkomen tribesmen and wounded two others while returning fire, said Maj. Josslyn Aberle, 4th Infantry Division spokeswoman. She said the Americans came under fire as they arrived to put down an outbreak of ethnic fighting Friday.

There were unconfirmed reports that deadly clashes between the Turkomen and Kurds erupted after minority Kurds allegedly destroyed a newly reopened Turkomen Islamic shrine. The reports claimed there were five Turkomen and three Kurds killed and eleven injured in the fighting. Aberle said it was the first outbreak of ethnic conflict in the region since May.

Iraqi Turkomans are an ethnic minority with strong ties to neighboring Turkey. They live primarily in Iraq's north and northeast.

Soldiers from the 4th Infantry Division discovered a MiG 23 fighter jet, partially buried and covered with camouflage netting, and an anti-aircraft gun north of Balad, 55 miles north of Baghdad. Aberle said they also discovered a weapons cache including six mortars, three cases of mortar rounds and 25 crates of anti-aircraft ammunition.

Aberle said U.S. troops wounded two young Iraqis Friday night when they came upon a group of 17 young men loitering at a gas station after curfew in Dhuluaiyah, 40 miles north of Baghdad.

When troops arrived, the young men began to run, she said. After soldiers fired two warning shots, 15 of the group stopped, but the two who continued to run were shot in the legs. All were detained and were being questioned.

In Baghdad, U.N. staff, international and Iraqi, worked in tents set up inside the compound beside the battered U.N. building Saturday. Staff complained that the U.S.-led coalition had done little to provide security in the area before the bombing.

"It was the coalition's fault, because it was their job to watch the parking area where the bombing happened, ... but it seems they were incapable of that," said Mohammed Abdul Aziz, an Iraqi security officer working for the United Nations.

The U.S.-led coalition claims responsibility in the country in general but says it has no obligation to guard specific sites such as the U.N. headquarters and diplomatic missions. However, U.S. troops are guarding locations such as Iraqi banks and the oil ministry.

However, Maj. Mark Johnston said soldiers from the 82nd Airborne Division had taken control of security at the bombed hotel, which became U.N. headquarters in Baghdad after the 1991 Gulf War.

"It's still a dangerous site. We are still in the recovery stage," he said.

Iraqi employees and guards at the compound were being questioned by American authorities on the suspicion that the suicide truck bombing could have been an inside job. Many of the security guards at the hotel had been in place before the war and were linked to Saddam's security service.

Bernard Kerik, the former New York police commissioner who is working to re-establish an Iraqi police force, said the placement of the truck bomb and the timing of Tuesday's attack had raised suspicions.

The truck was as close as it could have been to the office of Vieira de Mello and the bomb went off as a high-level official meeting was in progress in the office.

"Would the security guards have access to that information? Would the people who work in that building for any other reason have access to it?" Kerik told The Associated Press on Friday.

In a tearful and brief ceremony on Friday the coffin bearing Vieira de Mello's body and draped in the U.N. flag was carried aboard a Brazilian air force plane at Baghdad International Airport. Bagpipers played "Amazing Grace," and L. Paul Bremer, the top U.S. civil administrator in Iraq, wept as he consoled a sobbing U.N. employee.

The plane stopped over in Geneva, where Vieira de Mello's wife and two children boarded the aircraft before heading for his native Brazil, airport officials in Switzerland said.

Eighty-six seriously wounded U.N. workers were being airlifted out of Iraq for medical care.

Two U.N. employees were still unaccounted for and an unknown number of people — visitors to the building — were still buried in the rubble. The U.N.'s official death toll stood at 20. However, independent checks by The Associated Press at area hospitals showed at least 23 died in the blast.

___

Associated Press writer Hrvoje Hranjski in Tikrit contributed to this report.

A British soldier stands guard at the British Embassy in Baghdad, Iraq, Aug. 23, 2003. Three British soldiers were killed Saturday in Iraq's second city of Basra when their vehicle crashed into a wall after being pursued and fired at by gunmen in a car, local witnesses said. In Baghdad, U.N. staff went back to work four days after a truck bombing devastated their compound, killing 24 people. Photo by Aladin Abdel Naby/Reuters

A British soldier is seen inspecting a damaged vehicle in Basra, Iraq, Aug. 23, 2003, in this image taken from video footage. Three British soldiers were killed and another was seriously wounded in Basra on Saturday, a British military spokesman said. Locals said a British vehicle had come under fire from another car, veered off the road and crashed. Photo by Reuters Tv/Reuters

[Austin Willard Wright]

Please tell me specifically how many Americans were killed in combat action in post-war Austria or Germany. Unless you can show that is anywhere near of the current bloodletting in Iraq, this comparison will not hold water. BTW, I'll bet you dollars to donuts the comparison in American combat deaths between Iraq and post-war Austria/Germany wasn't even close.

[Austin Willard Wright]

Thank you for cold calculation of "kill rates" Mr. Spock.

[TexKat]

President's Radio Address

August 23, 2003

THE PRESIDENT: Good morning. Earlier this week, terrorists struck the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad. The U.N. personnel and Iraqi citizens killed in the bombings were engaged in a purely humanitarian mission. Men and women in the building were working on reconstruction, medical care for Iraqis, and the distribution of food. Among the dead was Sergio Vieira de Mello, the U.N. representative for Iraq -- a good man serving an important cause.

On the same day, a terrorist in Jerusalem murdered 20 innocent people riding a bus, including five Americans. The killer had concealed under his clothing a bomb filled with metal fragments, designed to kill and injure the greatest number of people possible. Among the 110 people hurt were 40 children.

These two bombings reveal, once again, the nature of the terrorists, and why they must be defeated. In their malicious view of the world, no one is innocent. Relief workers and infants alike are targeted for murder. Terrorism may use religion as a disguise, but terrorism violates every religion and every standard of decency and morality.

The terrorists have declared war on every free nation and all our citizens. Their goals are clear. They want more governments to resemble the oppressive Taliban that once ruled Afghanistan. Terrorists commit atrocities because they want the civilized world to flinch and retreat so they can impose their totalitarian vision. There will be no flinching in this war on terror, and there will be no retreat.

From Afghanistan to Iraq, to the Philippines and elsewhere, we are waging a campaign against the terrorists and their allies, wherever they gather, wherever they plan, and wherever they act. This campaign requires sacrifice, determination and resolve, and we will see it through. Iraq is an essential front in this war. Now we're fighting terrorists and remnants of that regime who have everything to lose from the advance of freedom in the heart of the Middle East.

In most of Iraq, there is steady movement toward reconstruction and a stable, self-governing society. This progress makes the remaining terrorists even more desperate and willing to lash out against symbols of order and hope, like coalition forces and U.N. personnel. The world will not be intimidated. A violent few will not determine the future of Iraq, and there will be no return to the days of Saddam Hussein's torture chambers and mass graves.

Working with Iraqis, coalition forces are on the offensive against these killers. Aided by increasing flow of intelligence from ordinary Iraqis, we are stepping up raids, seizing enemy weapons, and capturing enemy leaders. The United States, the United Nations, and the civilized world will continue to stand with the people of Iraq as they reclaim their nation and their future.

We're determined, as well, not to let murderers decide the future of the Middle East. A Palestinian state will never be built on a foundation of violence. The hopes of that state and the security of Israel both depend on an unrelenting campaign against terror waged by all parties in the region. In the Middle East, true peace has deadly enemies. Yet America will be a consistent friend of every leader who works for peace by actively opposing violence.

All nations of the world face a challenge and a choice. In continued acts of murder and destruction, terrorists are testing our will, hoping we will weaken and withdraw. Yet across the world, they are finding that our will cannot be shaken. Whatever the hardships, we will persevere. We will continue this war on terror until all the killers are brought to justice. And we will prevail.

Thank you for listening.

END

[jwfiv]

Thanks for posting the President's address, and your redlining the key points.

I'm tired of hearing people complain that Rumsfeld didn't envision the current situation, that he and others in the Administration expected a "cakewalk".

Dubya warned us all along that it's gonna be a long tough fight.

I'm just a civvie schmuck and even I knew the postwar phase would devolve into exactly this...no, actually I figured it would be a little worse.

We take the fight to them, and nip their plans in the bud, or someday we'll be laboring to clear the rubble that was DC, or NYC.

It's an easy choice that some people just don't grok.

[Numbers Guy]

Is it worth losing the White House, losing the Supreme Court for generations, losing the social battles here in the US all for some country of really minimal importance to us?

So you think withdrawing from Iraq and letting the Baathists take over again will somehow help Bush politically?

As for "minimal importance", uh, we're in a war on terror right now. Iraq is next door to Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Syria, three key nations with links to terrorism. Iraq is the crossroads.

And if a few dozen soldiers getting picked off causes us to put our tails between our legs and run away, it will only make things worse and lead to more terror attacks, not fewer.