U.S. forces push through the center of Fallujah, tighten cordon around city to block fleeing insurgents By Jim Krane
ASSOCIATED PRESS
7:19 a.m. November 9, 2004
NEAR FALLUJAH, Iraq – U.S. Army and Marine units thrust through the center of the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah on Tuesday, fighting bands of guerrillas in the streets and conducting house-to-house searches on the second day of a major offensive to retake the city from Islamic militants.
A total of 14 Americans have been killed in the past two days across Iraq – including three killed in Fallujah on Tuesday and 11 others who died Monday, most of them as guerrillas launched a wave of attacks in Baghdad and southwest of Fallujah, a senior Pentagon official said.
The 11 deaths were the highest one-day U.S. toll in more than six months.
As fighting raged in Fallujah, Prime Minister Ayad Allawi declared a nighttime curfew in Baghdad and its surroundings – the first curfew in the capital for a year – a day after a string of insurgent attacks in the city killed nine Iraqis and wounded more than 80.
Anger grew among Iraq's Sunni Muslim majority over the assault on the mainly Sunni city of Fallujah. A powerful group of clerics called for a boycott of January elections.
U.S. and Iraqi forces launched the invasion of Fallujah to restore government control in the insurgents' strongest bastion ahead of the elections. But the assault risks alienating Sunnis – and if they boycott, the vote's legitimacy could be deeply undermined.
In Fallujah, heavy street clashes were raging in northern neighborhoods. By midday, U.S. armored units had made their way to the highway running east-west through the city's center and crossed over into the southern part of Fallujah, a major milestone.
Still, the military reported lighter-than-expected resistance in Jolan, a warren of alleyways in northwestern Fallujah where guerillas were believed to be at their strongest.
That could be a sign that insurgents left the city before the operation started or that the troops have not yet reached the center location to which the resistance has fallen back, Pentagon officials said in Washington.
An estimated 6,000 U.S. troops and 2,000 allied Iraqi soldiers invaded the city from the north Monday night in a quick, powerful start to an offensive aimed at re-establishing government control ahead of the January elections. The guerrillas fought off a bloody Marine offensive against the city in April.
Allawi called on Fallujah's fighters to lay down their weapons to spare the city and allow government forces to take control, "The political solution is possible even if military operations are ongoing," his spokesman said. On one thoroughfare in the city, U.S. troops traded fire with gunmen holed up in a row of houses about 100 yards away. An American gunner on an armored vehicle let loose with his machine gun, grinding the upper part of a small building to rubble.
Elsewhere, witnesses reported seeing at least two American tanks engulfed in flames. A Kiowa helicopter flying over southeast Fallujah took groundfire, injuring the pilot, but he managed to return to the U.S. base.
The once constant thunder of artillery barrages was halted, since so many troops are moving inside the city's narrow streets. U.S. and Iraqi forces surrounded a mosque inside the city that was used as arms depot and insurgent meeting point, the BBC reported.
Col. Michael Formica, commander of the 1st Cavalry Division's 2nd Brigade, said Tuesday that a security cordon around the city will be tightened to ensure insurgents dressed in civilian clothing don't slip out.
"My concern now is only one – not to allow any enemy to escape. As we tighten the noose around him, he will move to escape to fight another day. I do not want these guys to get out of here. I want them killed or captured as they flee," he said.
Guerrillas continued their campaign elsewhere. Hundreds of militants swarmed the streets of Ramadi, another insurgent stronghold 70 miles west of Baghdad. Gunfire rang out in the city center, and a destroyed car smeared with blood was seen.
The military said Tuesday afternoon that three troops were killed and another 14 wounded in and around Fallujah during the past 12 hours.
Two Marines died Monday before the major assault when their bulldozer flipped over into the Euphrates River. Also Monday, three Marines and six soldiers were killed, most by homemade bombs, the Pentagon official said on condition of anonymity.
Some 10,000-15,000 U.S. troops have surrounded Fallujah, along with allies Iraqi forces, according to the top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. George Casey. Commanders estimate around 3,000 Sunni fighters are in Fallujah, perhaps around 20 percent of them foreign Islamic militants.
The number of civilians in the city is unknown. A large portion of the city's 200,000 to 300,000 residents are believed to have fled before the offensive, but the Pentagon has acknowledged it doesn't know how many
Overnight, air and artillery barrages lit up the skies over Fallujah lit up with flashes.
"Every minute, hundreds of bombs and shells are exploding," Fadril al-Badrani, a resident who lives in the center of Fallujah, said after nightfall Monday. "The north of the city is in flames. I can also see fire and smoke ... Fallujah has become like hell."
Al-Badrani said hundreds of houses had been destroyed.
U.S. troops cut off electricity to the city. Residents said they were without running water and were worried about food shortages because most shops in the city have been closed for the past two days.
A U.S. military spokesman estimated that 42 insurgents were killed across the city in bombardment and skirmishes before the main assault began Monday evening. Two Marines were killed when their bulldozer flipped over into the Euphrates near Fallujah.
On Monday, a doctor at a clinic in Fallujah, Mohammed Amer, reported 12 people were killed. Seventeen others, including a 5-year-old girl and a 10-year-old boy, were wounded, he said.
The question of casualties is a major factor in the offensive. Reports of hundreds of people killed during the Marine offensive in April outraged Iraqis and forced the Marines to pull back – allowing guerrillas to only strengthen their hold on the city.
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld insisted Monday, "There aren't going to be large numbers of civilians killed and certainly not by U.S. forces."
Allawi's government has also taken a prominent role in defending the assault – for which the prime minister gave the green light.
Still, the powerful Sunni cleric's group the Association of Muslim Scholars called for a boycott of the January elections.
The election is being held "over the corpses of those killed in Fallujah and the blood of the wounded," said Harith al-Dhari, the group's director.
Industry Minister Hajim Al-Hassani – of the mainly Sunni Iraqi Islamic Party – quit the government to protest the assault.
"The American attack on our people in Fallujah has led and will lead to more killings and genocide without mercy from the Americans," said party chief Mohsen Abdel-Hamid.
The U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday that it was "extremely concerned" about tens of thousands of people fleeing the Fallujah fighting – many of them now living in tents.
"The majority of civilians appear to have left the city, although it is difficult to establish numbers with any certainty," said Jennifer Clark, spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.
Iraqi troops with U.S. Marines move into the Sunni Muslim city of Falluja. REUTERS/Eliana Aponte
A video grab shows U.S. armoured vehicles preparing to advance into the Sunni Muslim city of Falluja. REUTERS/REUTERS TV POOL
Smoke rises from a train station after the U.S. bombardment the Iraqi city of Falluja. Scores of Iraqi government forces moved into a Falluja railway station on Tuesday captured by U.S. marines after fierce overnight battles with insurgents, a Reuters witness said. REUTERS/Eliana Aponte
A US soldier sits in his armoured vehicle during the bombardment of Fallujah. US troops and crack Iraqi soldiers surged into rubble-strewn districts in the heart of Fallujah, seizing one third of the city after hours of street fighting with rebels in the largest military onslaught since the war.(AFP/Patrick Baz)
A video grab shows U.S. Marines fighting into the Sunni Muslim city of Falluja, November 9, 2004. U.S. forces pushed to the centre of the Iraqi city of Falluja on Tuesday, a U.S. Military source said. U.S and Iraqi forces thrust into the city after starting a full-scale offensive on Monday night. The pictures are shot from embedded cameramen accompanying U.S. military. REUTERS/REUTERS TV POOL
Smoke bellows from the railroad station in Fallujah, Iraq, as U.S. Army and Marine units pounded the city with air strikes and artillery, Tuesday, Nov. 9, 2004. U.S. and Iraqi units roared into the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah through a breach near the railroad station at dawn Tuesday. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)
US Marines of the First Division arrest Iraqi men at the railroad station in Fallujah, Iraq, as U.S. Army and Marine units pounded the city with air strikes and artillery Tuesday, Nov. 9, 2004. U.S. and Iraqi units roared into the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah through a breach near the railroad station at dawn Tuesday. (AP Photo/Anja Niedringhaus)
