Marines Encircle Fallouja (Operation Valiant Resolve commencing)

LA Times ^ | 4-4-04 | Tony Perry and Edmund Sanders

[BurbankKarl]

FALLOUJA, Iraq — Thousands of Marines surrounded this anti-American stronghold early today in preparation for a complex raid to retake control of the city and apprehend those responsible for last week's slayings of four U.S. security contractors.

The highly anticipated action, dubbed Operation Valiant Resolve, was expected to be one of the biggest military offensives since the fall of Saddam Hussein's government a year ago.

All roads leading to this city of 300,000 were cut off and barricaded with tanks and concertina wire. Working through the cold and windy desert night, under a large moon, Marines set up camps for detainees and residents who might flee any fighting. Before dawn, several Marine positions were hit by mortar rounds and rocket-propelled grenade fire. Bursts of automatic gunfire could be heard throughout the city.

[victoryatallcosts]

It just seems logical to me. Lugar, Kerry, McCain, and these others want to send "more troops" but they don't know what they're going to do with them. It's simply a knee-jerk reaction.

More troops will mean more casualties and make a Beruit-type event more likely. This was one of the larger problems in Vietnam is that, to make himself look strong, Johnson simply shipped more and more troops over there without any idea what they were supposed to be doing (and with the ones on the front line not allowed to do what they needed to do).

[saquin]

SEVERAL people were killed and others wounded today when US troops fought insurgents in the restive Sunni Muslim town of Fallujah, west of Baghdad, a witness said.

There was no official confirmation of the report but US forces sealed all the roads leading to Fallujah, barricading residents inside the flashpoint town

"US forces bombed the Goland residential neighbourhood after coming under mortar attack from unknown assailants," Borhan Abed, a resident of the northern Fallujah neighbourhood, said.

Several people were killed, others wounded and some houses hit, said Abed, adding that he went on to the roof of his house when the fighting started and saw US aircraft overhead.

According to Abed the fighting erupted at 4.00 am (10am AEST) and lasted 90 minutes.

http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,9196396%255E1702,00.html

[CyberAnt]

We had to have a plan - we couldn't just ride down the street shooting ..! Please!

[Travis McGee]

YOu're not kidding!

[Happy2BMe]

U.S. officials vowed Thursday to bring overwhelming military might to the outlaw city of Fallujah a day after insurgents killed five U.S. soldiers and dragged the charred corpses of four American civilians through the city.

Describing the attacks against the soldiers and civilians as "bestial," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt promised the military would re-establish control of what has emerged as the center of Iraqi resistance.

"We will respond," said Kimmitt, the U.S.-led coalition's top military spokesman. "It will be deliberate and precise and be overwhelming ... We will kill them or we will capture them."

The warning sets the stage for a clash between newly arrived U.S. Marines, who have assumed control of the area, and anti-U.S. residents of a city that has resisted repeated efforts to bring it under control.

The U.S. warning appeared to reflect a growing frustration with the coalition's inability to break the resistance in the Fallujah region and rising anger triggered by the horrific images broadcast on international television of U.S. civilians being burned and mutilated by mobs only 35 miles from the capital. Officials said the bodies have been recovered.

Two of the victims were identified by family members as Jerko "Jerry" Zovko, 32, from Willoughby, Ohio; and Michael Teague, 38, from Clarksville, Tenn. Both were decorated Army veterans.

Paul Bremer, the coalition's chief administrator, said the deaths would not go unpunished and branded the attackers as "ghouls and cowards."

The Iraqi Governing Council's representative from the sprawling Anbar province, which includes Fallujah, said Wednesday's murders brought shame to all of Iraq (news - web sites). "As an Iraqi, I feel as much revulsion as any American," Samir Shakir Mahmoud said. "It must stand condemned."

The separate attacks against soldiers and civilians Wednesday represented the bloodiest day for the coalition since early January. The five U.S. soldiers were killed when a convoy rolled over a roadside bomb.

The four civilians were killed when rocket-propelled grenades and small-arms fire hit their two-vehicle convoy. The vehicles were set ablaze and the victims' bodies were mutilated. Two were hanged from a bridge.

The civilians were employees of Blackwater Security Consulting, a company based in North Carolina that also protects Bremer.

Kimmitt defended the military's decision not to charge into the city center Wednesday as jubilant mobs displayed the civilians' bodies. To have done so, he said, would have put soldiers at risk of ambush. He said the coalition was acting on the premise that all of the attackers were Iraqis and not foreign terrorists.

On Thursday, another military convoy was hit by a roadside bomb. The blast wounded four Marines.

[McGavin999]

Sounds like a bit of a swat. They are nowhere near done yet.

[BurbankKarl]

I concur. I was listening to some talk show host on Saturday stating Fallujah never saw the fighting before the fall of Saddam, so they were never shown the shock and awe, etc. I don't know if I buy that....I say you shoot anytone holding a gun, and obviously, who shoots back.

---

>>>We have to let people know that the terrorists who are harming their families and violating Islam are going against peace and brotherhood," said Capt. Michael Fehm.

[LdSentinal]

Looks like this is a coordinated effort between the Sunnis in Falluja and the Shiia cleric Sadar.

Call me a optimist, but it sounds like the insurgency west of Baghdad is running out of men and munitions and are asking Sadar to reinforce them.

[olde north church]

Under normal circumstances I would respectfully disagree and I understand your point 100%. What crippled that American response, all the war around was the sanitization job the mass media did in this country.
Had they referred to 9/11 to their victims properly as "casualties", which they were. Had they showed the total devestation of 9/11, the most recent attacks, and all others, Americans would know what was going on and what was at stake.
I'll have to continue later. I apologize.

[Getsmart64]

Ok buttroe....have a nice life...I'll be laughing at you when they stick it up you know where....those of you whom know about the ME knows what I'm talking about....

[Hillarys Gate Cult]

I'm not talking about Falluja, it's a diversion!

I'm of the opinion that the other actions in Iraq were a misguided diversion to get us away from Falluja. I know we should be concerned about collateral damage, but I don't think fighting a PC battle is worth the life or limb of one soldier.

Most of he media are going to report what they want about this fight, no matter how careful our forces are or how good or bad the end result. As long as it makes President Bush look bad, that's all that matters to them.

[BurbankKarl]

they should have buzzed them with a pair of B1-Bs during morning prayers

[Travis McGee]

I agree, I wish Americans understood we're in a world war, and it's going to take a long time, and cost a lot of good men.

[LdSentinal]

I'll be laughing at you when they stick it up you know where....those of you whom know about the ME knows what I'm talking about....

So, which one of the Queer Eye for the Straight Guy are you? The fat one?

[My Dog Likes Me]

"2 days too late."

I was just thinking that myself. The enemy has had time to fortify and plan. We lost the initiative when we didn't pull a Blitzkreig number on these SOBs last week.

I guess the Marines didn't want to get in the way of Friday "prayers" by the death cultists of Islam.

[Cap Huff]

That's what it looks like, but I would never have thought it after the attacks on the Shi'ites during the Ashoura thing some weeks ago. I figured that was al-Zarqawi, and I also figured Fallujah last week was also al-Zarqawi. If what the WP is reporting is true, then my thinking needs some serious re-thinking regarding those two atrocities.

[tubavil]

I think the (upcoming) battle of Fallujah has the potential to make or break the 'war' and maybe the next presidency.

It could go horribly or very well.

One of the first orders of business is to ice Sadr, who on Friday said he was opening Iraqi chapters of Hizballah and Hamas.

[Getsmart64]

I agree...ping him....lol

[McGavin999]

Look, Sadar is backed by the Iranian Mullahs. This whole Falluja thing may have been set up to get our attention over there. Sadar seems to have been working under the radar and has brought several factions together....Shiia AND Sunni.