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Posted on 04/04/2004 4:22:35 PM PDT by Happy2BMe
By KHALID MOHAMMED
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NAJAF, Iraq (AP) - Supporters of an anti-American cleric rioted in four Iraqi cities Sunday, killing eight U.S. troops and one Salvadoran soldier in the worst unrest since the spasm of looting and arson immediately after the fall of Saddam Hussein.
The U.S. military on Sunday reported two Marines were killed in a separate "enemy action" in Anbar province, raising the toll of American service members killed in Iraq to at least 610.
The rioters were supporters of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. They were angry over Saturday's arrest on murder charges of one of al-Sadr's aides, Mustafa al-Yacoubi, and the closure of a pro-al-Sadr newspaper.
Near the holy city of Najaf, a gunbattle at a Spanish garrison killed at least 22 people, including two coalition soldiers - an American and a Salvadoran.
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A resident said two Humvees were seen burning in the neighborhood, and that some American soldiers had taken refuge in a building. The report could not be independently confirmed, and it was unclear whether the soldiers involved were those who died.
A column of American tanks was seen moving through the center of Baghdad Sunday evening, possibly headed toward the fighting.
The military said the fighting erupted after members of a militia loyal to radical Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada al-Sadr took control of police stations and government buildings in the neighborhood.
Protesters clashed with Italian and British forces in other cities in a broad, violent challenge to the U.S.-led coalition, raising questions about its ability to stabilize Iraq ahead of a scheduled June 30 handover of power to Iraqis.
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"These organizations will give Iraqis the means to defend their country against terrorists and insurgents," L. Paul Bremer said at a press conference.
About three miles outside the holy city of Najaf, supporters of al-Sadr opened fire on the Spanish garrison during a street protest that drew about 5,000 people. The protesters were angry over the arrest of the cleric's aide, said the Spanish Defense Ministry in Madrid.
The attackers opened fire at about noon, said Cmdr. Carlos Herradon, a spokesman for the Spanish headquarters in nearby Diwaniyah.
The Spanish and Salvadoran soldiers inside the garrison fired back, and assailants later regrouped in three clusters outside the base as the shooting continued for several hours.
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More than 200 people were wounded, said Falah Mohammed, director of the Najaf health department. El Salvador's defense minister said several Salvadoran soldiers were wounded.
The death toll of at least 20 included two Iraqi soldiers who were inside the Spanish base, witnesses said.
Spain has 1,300 troops stationed in Iraq, and the Central American contingent is of a similar size. The Salvadorans are under Spanish command as part of an international brigade that includes troops from Central America.
Multiple train bombings in Madrid last month that killed 191 people have been blamed on al-Qaida-linked terrorists, who said they were punishing Spain for its alliance with the United States in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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In El Salvador, the defense minister said the attack will not alter his country's role in reconstruction efforts.
"It reinforces even more our decision to continue helping a country that is suffering," Juan Antonio Martinez said Sunday.
The protesters were upset over the detention of al-Yacoubi, a senior aide to the 30-year-old al-Sadr, who opposes the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq. Al-Sadr is at odds with most Shiites, who hope to gain substantial power in the new Iraqi government.
Shiites comprise about 60 percent of Iraq's 25 million people but were brutally repressed by the regime of Saddam Hussein, a Sunni Muslim.
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Spanish-led forces said they did not participate in the arrest.
In central Baghdad's Firdaus Square, police fired warning shots during a protest by hundreds of al-Sadr supporters against al-Yacoubi's arrest. At least two protesters were injured, witnesses said.
In Kufa, near Najaf, al-Sadr supporters took over a police station and seized guns inside. No police were in sight.
In the southern city of Nasiriyah, Italian troops traded fire with militiamen demonstrating against al-Yacoubi's detention, said Lt. Col. Pierluigi Monteduro, chief of staff of Italian troops in the region. One Italian officer was wounded in the leg.
Also in the south, British troops clashed with protesters in Amarah, according to the Ministry of Defense in London. It was unclear whether there were casualties.
Al-Sadr's office in Baghdad issued a statement later Sunday calling off street protests and saying the cleric would stage a sit-in at a mosque in Kufa, where he has delivered fiery weekly sermons for months.
Al-Sadr supporters also were angered by the March 28 closure of his weekly newspaper by U.S. officials. The Americans alleged the newspaper was inciting violence against coalition troops.
The two U.S. Marines, both assigned to the 1st Marine Division, were killed by an "enemy action" in Anbar province Saturday, the military said. One died Saturday and the other Sunday, the statement said without providing details.
Anbar is an enormous stretch of land reaching to the Jordanian and Syrian borders west of Baghdad that includes Fallujah, a city where four American civilian contractors were slain Wednesday.
At a checkpoint in Samarra, about 60 miles north of Baghdad, that was manned by Iraqi Civil Defense personnel, a bomb killed three security officers and wounded another, workers at Samarra General Hospital said.
In Kirkuk, also in the north, a car bomb exploded, killing three civilians and wounding two others, police said.
Bremer on Sunday announced the appointments of Ali Allawi, the interim trade minister, as the new defense minister and Mohammed al-Shehwani, a former Iraqi air force officer who fled Iraq in 1990, as head of the Iraqi National Intelligence Service.
Late Sunday, U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi and a team that will assist Iraqis in the political transition to an interim Iraqi government arrived in Baghdad, the United Nations said.
This was no "brush under the rug" deal.
What response in Fallujah (and Iraq) is in order here?
Does Fallujah change anything at all?
Let me say this as clearly as I can. Bush does not control our military response in Iraq. That includes the timing, the tactics, and the degree of our eventual response. More than any Commander in Chief in recent history, he has made it a policy to allow the military to make tactical decisions. That means that the men who are making the decisions concerning our response to Fallujah, are the men who will lead the action in Fallujah.
Fuck politics. This is war. If I could get on a plane right now to Iraq and STANCH this BULLSHIT, I would.
It's circle the wagons time. God, I may not make it through the week.
We won because we were both careful and BRAVE.
Hang in there!
You are kidding right? Non-stop imagery on Al Jazeera of unarmed people getting sprayed across the town square would be a positive thing for our troops there? Do you think the average Iraqi is going to say to himself, "well, those people were giving aid and cover to the snipers, so they were legitimate targets". The people rioting today are a very small percentage of Shiite in Iraq, without a lot of popular support. But they're still Arab Muslims, and if you want to increase their numbers 10,000 fold, just pump a few 105mm shells into their happy faces. None of them are worth a single American life, but if we took your suggested course of action our guys on the ground would be fighting a couple million screaming looneys instead of a few thousand.
Well organized ambush? Right in town? In broad daylight? If it was organized, why didn't any friendlys warn them before the arrived at the ambush point?
Their corpses were burned and trashed by an organized mob after the armed ambushers were long gone.
So the mob was organized too? Where those little kids that were beating on the dead American's part of this organized mob?
Even if our troops had arrived just minutes after the intial hit, they would have found no military targets.
What, are we waiting for that *organized* mob of fanatics to become stronger, so one day we can consider them a military target?
Unbelievable.....
I'm enraged, bloodthirsty, murderous and more and I can't hardly stand being here not doing anything to go after the savages.
Sorry. Guess it's some tribal American thing. Sorry if I'm too pi$$ed off that this stuff is going on and using bad words.
I will be OK tomorrow, unless more are killed and then.. you don't expect Americans to be enraged over this? What, we should just call in for tickets to Dr. Phil?
"And now we see the consequence of weakness."
As a Marine, wouldn't it concern you if "long-term" tactics were changed as a result of a single action? Do you think the "long-term" tactics were developed without the assumption that good guys might die at some point? These tactics weren't developed by Martha Stewert. The Marine 2 Star in charge there wears a bronze star awarded for valor in combat. This ain't no perfumed prince. Graphic violence is a shocker to someone unfamiliar with combat but burned corpses aren't a rare sight in a combat zone. Let these men do their job as professionals. Not enraged amatuers.
"Right in town?"
Yes
"In broad daylight?"
Yes
"If it was organized, why didn't any friendlys warn them before the arrived at the ambush point?"
Not too many friendlies in Fallujah. The men who were ambushed were civilians escorting a civilian truck convoy. This wasn't a military operation. That's not to say it wasn't professional. But many of the assets that support a military operation weren't supporting this one. The mob that burned the bodies of the Americans killed, was not a military target. Sorry, but that is a simple fact, and our military does not train its combatants to purposely violate the laws of armed conflict.
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