Posted on 04/25/2004 8:13:15 PM PDT by AntiGuv
FALLUJAH, Iraq - The U.S. military extended a cease-fire for Fallujah on Sunday for at least two more days, backing down from warnings of an all-out Marine assault and announcing that American and Iraqi forces would begin joint patrols in the city.
The patrols are to begin as early as Tuesday, and Fallujah officials will announce in the city that anyone seen carrying a weapon will be considered hostile.
Meanwhile, a U.S. general told The Associated Press that troops will move into a base on the edge of the holy city of Najaf to be abandoned by Spanish troops when they withdraw from Iraq in the coming weeks. But the Americans will remain away from holy sites — an effort to avoid outraging Iraq's Shiite majority, which opposes any U.S. foray near their most sacred shrine.
The troops aim to "counter the forces" of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, Brig. Gen. Mark Hertling said. A coalition spokesman, Dan Senor, said weapons were being stockpiled in mosques and schools in Najaf — a practice he said must stop.
The measures in Fallujah and Najaf were announced a day after President Bush held a teleconference with senior national security and military advisers to discuss the situation in Fallujah and the rest of Iraq.
The moves appeared aimed at bringing a degree of control over the cities without re-igniting the intense violence that began when U.S. authorities moved on the two fronts simultaneously at the start of April.
The wave of fighting since has killed up to 1,200 Iraqis and 111 U.S. troops, nearly as many in 25 days as the 115 Americans who were killed during the two-month invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein a year ago.
The deal to bring patrols into Fallujah meant extending the cease-fire, the U.S. military said. Military action in the city was still an option, Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said, but the warning was dramatically toned down from those in the past week.
The new steps in Fallujah were not without risks.
There was little guarantee that guerrillas in Fallujah won't attack joint U.S.-Iraqi patrols. Some Marine commanders said privately they had hoped to push on with an offensive deeper into the city and were concerned Marine patrols would become targets.
Iraqi security forces due to patrol with them were equally ill at ease.
"I don't feel safe because the Americans themselves are not safe," police Capt. Jassim Abed said. "They get shot at. They can't guarantee safety for themselves, so how can they guarantee my safety?"
Marine Lt. Col Brennan Byrne, on Fallujah's outskirts, said patrols may not start until Thursday as Marines and Iraqi forces organize them.
He said the patrols would be backed by armor and air support but for now will steer clear of Fallujah's Julan district, a poorer neighborhood where many insurgents are concentrated.
"It will be a combat patrol in the city that is prepared to deal with anything they run into," he said. "If we are attacked, we will absolutely eradicate that source of fire." But he added that individual attacks would not lead to a wider engagement.
U.S. occupation leaders are under pressure not to launch major military action. Some U.S.-picked Iraqi leaders were angered by the Fallujah siege. The top U.N. envoy for Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi — who has been asked by Washington to help pick a new government — warned the United States against assaults on Najaf or Fallujah
"When you surround a city, you bomb the city, when people cannot go to hospital, what name do you have for that? ... If you have enemies there, this is exactly what they want you to do, to alienate more people so that more people support them rather than you," Brahimi said of Fallujah on ABC's "This Week."
"In this situation, there is no military solution," he said.
In the latest U.S. deaths, a soldier was killed Sunday when a roadside bomb hit his patrol in eastern Baghdad. A U.S. Coast Guardsman also died of wounds suffered the night before in a suicide boat attack on oil facilities that killed two Navy sailors.
(Excerpt) Read more at story.news.yahoo.com ...
Dude, you are paid to be a cop. Safety is not guaranteed.
BUSH MAKES THE CALL: NO FULL SCALE FALLUJAH OFFENSIVE
That is a Drudge Headline!
Politicians micro-managing military exercises--sounds like the Vietnam strategy to me. I think Bevalaqua, an ex-military man himself, is looking out for the best interests of his brothers.
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