Posted on 11/10/2004 8:03:38 AM PST by Dog
Expected to start shortly....the briefing is coming from Fallujah.
I think they are keeping him alive because unlike France, hell is having second thoughts about receiving such a despicable piece of human debris.
Trouble in Mosul,too..Thay are trying to create problems in other areas to detract from Fallujah..I want those car bombing, beheading, mortar firing , booby trapping;convoy attacking;IED planting terrorists so bad.
Please please please, let him live just long enough to see this!
I must've completely missed it. Was it covered for more than one minute? Well, the transcript will be up tomorrow on this site:
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/
Who? Arafat? heh! :)
Thanks..It was an Iraqi General I saw briefly on CNN..I hope we get an update from our military.
As do I. It seems to me that when the military takes the time to speak to the press about this ONGOING battle, the least the press can do is cover it!
The Baghdad region has been ramped up, too. I imagine it's bumpier everywhere. I just e-mailed my friend at Mosul and am waiting for a response.
I want those evildoers dead to the last one. The horrible, unspeakable things they have done...to westerners and to innocent Iraqis...I feel such a loathing for those terrorists. I've personally lost American and Iraqi friends in this mess. And then every time we lose a soldier...
We watch from afar..You are there..God be with you,our military and the innocents..Let us know how things are going.
May Iraq be liberated from these terrorists and extremists.
I believe it was more than hostages, wasn't it? They said that people who "cooperated" with the coalition were taken there and slaughtered.
"New juror has bright dyed red hair on top and dyed MAGENTA hair in back. She sounds like a person I would like to decide my fate."
You're talking about California. Are you sure it's a she and not a he?
Give 'em hell, soldier!!! And God Bless You and your band of brothers. May Our Lord install a hedge of protection around all of you .. we LOVE you, and give you honor and gratitude for your courageous service.
Allegra, how are our boys holding up there where you are? Did you get a morale boost last week about this time? There are lots of people here behind you guys over there.
By NILES LATHEM
-----------------------------------------------------------
November 10, 2004 -- WASHINGTON U.S forces yesterday blitzed the center of the rebel stronghold of Fallujah, overwhelming bands of Iraqi terrorists in intense urban street battles the biggest ground assault since the Iraq invasion began last year.
Pentagon officials said U.S. Marines and Army troops, storming from the north in tanks and armored personnel carriers, crossed Highway 10, the strategic east-west road that bisects the turbulent city.
The strike put U.S. forces at the center of the city, which has been the strategic citadel for Ba'athist insurgents and al Qaeda-linked foreign fighters.
The battle resumed this morning after a relatively calm night as Marines let loose an artillery barrage at rebel targets and exchanged fire with insurgents in the northwestern district of Fallujah.
At least 10 U.S. and two Iraqi troops died in yesterday's fighting, Pentagon officials said.
The initial push into Fallujah involved about 6,500 troops from the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force and the Army's 1st Cavalry and 1st Infantry divisions. They engaged in fierce firefights with small, poorly organized bands of terrorist fighters in streets and alleyways.
The thugs were quickly overwhelmed by the superior American firepower as unmanned aircraft tracked the movements of the rebel bands.
U.S. troops also seized a key police station and took control of Fallujah's main railway station north of town. The Americans turned it into a base of operations, and elite Iraqi government troops took control of a handful of key mosques that were used by the guerrillas as weapons depots and command and control centers.
Army Lt. Gen. Thomas Metz, the on-the-ground commander of the U.S. operation, told Pentagon reporters that heavy fighting was going on in several neighborhoods. But he said the massive operation involving as many as 15,000 U.S. troops and 2,000 Iraqi troops was making progress with relatively few coalition casualties so far.
"I think we are looking at several more days of tough urban fighting. I think the enemy is fighting hard, but not to the death, and I think they are continuing to fall back," Metz said.
"We're a little ahead of schedule. I would say the coming days will tell us whether or not the enemy is thickening as he moves back into the city, or we are killing the enemy, or capturing the enemy, or pushing the enemy back."
U.S. and Iraqi troops were also seen conducting house-to-house searches and taunting insurgents over loudspeakers about their manhood a tactic that successfully drew out pro-Saddam militias from their hideouts during last year's invasion.
"Brave terrorists, I am waiting here for the brave terrorists. Come and kill us," one military psychological operations officer said in Arabic over a loudspeaker.
Pentagon officials told The Post last night that months before this week's assault on Fallujah, U.S. military and intelligence agencies conducted a massive intelligence-gathering operation over the terrorist-held city.
The military flew dozens of unmanned Global Hawk and Predator drone aircraft over Fallujah, getting instant video images. Sophisticated electronic eavesdropping equipment was used to intercept terrorist communications.
Military commanders were then able to draw up a street-to-street grid of the rebel defense systems and locate their safe houses, intelligence officials said.
That allowed the military to call in precision airstrikes that killed hundreds of insurgents days and weeks before U.S. ground troops moved in.
U.S. commanders and embedded reporters described yesterday's fighting as sporadic but often intense as advancing U.S. forces engaged in brief battles with small bands of terrorists. The enemy quickly was killed or fled when they encountered U.S. firepower.
The total of U.S. troops killed in the first two days of Operation Dawn stood at 12.
"Enemy casualties, I think, are significantly higher than I expected," Metz said.
But 13 U.S. troops were reported to have died in Mosul and southwest of Fallujah in the past 48 hours, in what appeared to be a strategy by guerrilla forces to open a second front and strike back elsewhere in Iraq while the U.S. military's focus is on Fallujah.
There were 130 attacks recorded in Iraq yesterday, including a series of attacks on police stations in the town of Baqouba in which 45 people, mostly Iraqi policemen, were killed.
And a posting on an Islamist Web site warned that a unified "Islamic resistance" would step up operations against the "American enemy" after yesterday's incursion into Fallujah. The posting told Iraqis in Baghdad and other cities to stay home today "to avoid putting their lives in danger."
In other developments:
* A series of explosions rocked central Baghdad this morning, authorities said. The explosions at around 7 a.m. were preceded by a single blast 20 minutes earlier.
* A Marine from Queens was killed Monday in Al Anbar province, the military announced. Lance Cpl. Jeffrey Lam, 22, died in a "non-hostile vehicle incident," the Defense Department said.
* Security guards thwarted a suicide car bomb attack against Charles Duelfer, who led the search for WMD in Iraq after the invasion, it was reported yesterday. The bomber tried to ram Duelfer's car, but Duelfer's bodyguards, two of whom died in the attack, cut off the bomber's car, ABC and CBS reported.
A lot of the guys from our base left for Fallujah a few days ago. The ones remaining behind are in good spirits but all of our thoughts are with those in Fallujah, so it has been quieter and not as boistrous as usual. We'll save that for when the troops come back victorious.
YES, there was a wonderful morale boost last week. I was in the chow hall when it was announced on TV that Kerry had called Bush and conceded and the reaction in there was wild and so much fun. Everyone, military and civilian alike was cheering and high-fiving. It was an experience I will never forget. :)
Thank you for your thoughtful post.
video of fighting here:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&e=2&u=/ap/20041110/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq
link below the photos
Good news. Exterminate the terrorists.
Hey, she sounds like my 3 year old's Sunday School teacher...!
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