Posted on 12/01/2005 2:20:57 AM PST by chemical_boy
Insurgents have attacked US bases and government offices in Ramadi, in western Iraq, and then dispersed throughout the city, residents say.
Scores of heavily-armed insurgents fired mortars and rockets at the buildings and then occupied several main streets.
The attack came as local leaders and US military officials were meeting at the al-Anbar provincial governor's office.
Ramadi has been a rebel stronghold for many months.
Residents in Ramadi told the Reuters news agency that hundreds of heavily armed men in masks were patrolling the main streets of the city and had set up checkpoints.
Citizens said leaflets distributed by the men declared that al-Qaeda in Iraq, the group run by Abu Musab Zarqawi, was now in control of the city.
US military meeting with local leaders and Insurgents decide to come out of the woodwork...looks like desperation on their part
We should have cleaned out Ramadi like we did Fallujah a long time ago but General Casey was against that.
Ramadi is long overdue for a full door to door offensive. The cat and mouse strategy is leaving our troops exposed.
The Tokyo Rose media will write this up to look like Tet...the media Tet, not the real Tet.
How does one occupy a street?? It would seem hard to defend against a kid with a BB gun.
"Scores of heavily-armed insurgents fired mortars and rockets at the buildings and then occupied several main streets"
I'm having a hard time understanding this story. So supposedly we have bases (plural) in Ramadi, and "military officials" there, and some bad guys attack us and then just stroll off to roam the streets and set up checkpoints? I'm calling bullshit on this one. I expect that if the enemy engaged our guys then in the end the enemy would be either dead or disappeared. Are we to believe that our troops are hunkered down in their bases taking fire, while our enemy enjoys control of nearby streets? Doesn't sound possible to me. Why wouldn't our guys just go out and kick the enemy's ass and/or call down death from above?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/iraq_ramadi_dc;_ylt=AjRVilw3rlQBqJ9bYboFU7Ks0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA2Z2szazkxBHNlYwN0bQ--
Reuters report
Iraqi rebels attack in Ramadi, seize some streets
Yes, it sounds like they got this story from Ahmed the Baathist. I think it means they fired, ran on the street, stood for a second and then disappeared. This is the insurgent version of occupied. It's a step up from activate an IED.
It's deja vu all over again! Only this time there's no Uncle Walter to sucker the public.
betcha won't read in the MSM next week when our troops make chopped liver out of them.
You will read about it if one of our troops gets within touching distance of mosque and then the screaming and howling from the media will start.
Round up all of the journalists and photographers and put them in the soccer stadium and don't let them out.
Sounds like our snipers are going to have a field day.
http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=2334662005
US bases attacked in Iraq
snip
US and Iraqi troops launched a joint operation near Ramadi yesterday, sweeping through an area used to rig car bombs.
About 500 Iraqi troops joined 2,000 US Marines, soldiers and sailors in a move to clear insurgents from an area on the eastern side of the Euphrates river near Hit, 85 miles west of Baghdad, the US command said in a statement.
The offensive came as President Bush said he hoped to shift more of the military burden onto the Iraqis as part of a strategy to draw down American forces.
In a statement, the military said the Hai Al Becker region "is suspected to be an al Qaida in Iraq safe area and base of operations for the manufacture of vehicle car bombs, roadside bombs." It described the area as a transit point for foreign fighters and Iraqi insurgents infiltrating from Syria into Iraq.
There were no reports of casualties during the first day of the operation, part of a series of sweeps through Sunni Arab towns along the Euphrates believed to be major insurgent strongholds. Residents reached by telephone said US forces warned townspeople by loudspeakers to stay in their homes for the next three days.
Sounds like there are some Rueters and Washington Post reporters with the terrorists in Ramadi trying to stir things up. They are doing a better job of covering the terrorists than Al Jersey.
Sounds like they are trying a Tet-68 redux...calling Walter Chronkite...call for you on the nearest white courtesy phone.
It's a good thing he wasn't on the air in December 1944. He'd have declared that the German counterattack in the Ardennes was proof that we could never destroy the Third Reich.
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